Rushing officially began Sunday, accompanied by a couple of significant rule changes regarding rush attendance and voting.

Starting this year, the Office of Student Life has made the women’s clubs teas mandatory for all women registered to pledge. Mark Jackson, associate director of student organizations and programs, said many of the women in the past had only attended one or two of the teas and rushes.

“The rushing process, to us, is about checking out every club and finding which club is the best fit,” Jackson said.

Samantha Jeffries, sophomore communications major from North Richland Hills, attended teas on Sunday. She said rushees were given a card to be stamped at every club’s tea. If they did not turn the card back into Jackson then they would be dropped from the pledging process.

“It didn’t bother me that we have had to go to all the teas because I think it’s better in helping everyone find the club that’s best for them,” Jeffries said. “I’m excited for all the changes that have been made to the rushing and pledging process.”

Voting was also revamped this year. All clubs will vote three times, followed by three rankings.

“In the past, we’ve done it where the prospectives come to me and rank on a sheet of paper, but this year we will do it totally online,” Jackson said.

There will be a 13-hour window for ranking to occur. Voting will take place at acu.edu/socialclubs.

Registration will also be earlier this year for men.

Men’s registration deadline for pledging is Sept. 12. Jackson emphasized men must register online by this time or they would be irrevocably ineligible for pledging during the fall semester.

Jackson said he hopes social clubs will become the largest entity on campus this year – even larger than the freshman class. He expects it will happen, with 340 women and 122 men registered to pledge.

“I’d love to get over 400 total,” Jackson said.

Gamma Sigma Phi expects to host around 80 men at their rushes, said Gabriel Guerra, psychology major from Edinburg. Guerra was less sure about the size of GSP’s pledge class, though.

“Our number of pledges typically don’t exceed 42-45, but we had a particularly large pledge class of 56 last year, which makes it tricky to forecast the number of guys who are wanting to take part in our pledging process,” he said.