Scarlet Honors Weekend is a long held tradition of the college. This year is no different: Wabash will host 170 prospective students this Friday and Saturday for Scarlet Honors Weekend, up from 145 students last December. Families will see a variety of panels meant to show what attending Wabash means. The weekend is a way for potential Little Giants to dip their toes into everything Wabash offers and its unique culture, especially in academics, extracurriculars, athletics and, of course, Greek life.

Students choose classes to sit in on, make preliminary course selections and attend social and extracurricular activities that help them understand the rhythm of a typical day on campus. Unique to Wabash is the overnight component of the event — primarily in fraternity houses — before students leave Saturday morning, something that often becomes the most memorable part of the visit.

“Attendance at Scarlet Honors Weekend is one of the strongest predictors of students that end up enrolling at Wabash,” said Senior Admissions Director Tyler Wade ’12. “A lot of folks might come in with some anxiety or concerns about what it might be like to go to an all-male college in the middle of west-central Indiana. When they get to campus, they tell us every year that they really value spending time with our current students. Once they can see themselves in those students, the likelihood that they’re willing to say yes to us is so much higher.”

“According to Wade, less than 10% of prospective students stay with independent hosts. Lambda Chi Alpha is hosting 31 and Phi Gamma Delta is hosting 20. The goal is to provide a more authentic experience of campus life than traditional day visits. Wabash is rare among colleges in offering an overnight stay at all, and admissions staff believe that authenticity is a major reason the event consistently impacts decisions.

Showcasing the vibrancy of Wabash culture and helping high schoolers find where they might fit is another part of the weekend, and Greek life plays a large role. However, the college emphasizes fraternities broadly rather than any single house. Student leaders share that sentiment.

“My goal is to have houses push for encouragement of joining fraternities overall, and not only their fraternity,” said Interfraternity Council (IFC) President Kyle Foster ’27. “Wabash is a fraternity in itself. Pushing fraternities and pushing Wabash culture go together.”

The IFC will have a new table at the activities fair this year where council members or individuals nominated by their houses will speak to incoming freshmen and answer questions about the system as a whole.

“To me, a successful weekend looks like getting a lot of those undecided guys to choose Wabash,” said Lambda Chi Alpha rush chair Ben Church ’28. “Hospitality and the authentic brotherhood of our campus are the way to do that.”

At the activities fair, clubs and student organizations will line Knowling Fieldhouse so families can get a snapshot of how students build community outside classes and residence halls. The college has used the same core model of panels and student-led interactions for the past several years.

For Wade, Foster and the many student hosts preparing for the weekend, the goal is simple: make each visitor feel like they belong.

“We try to remind students what it felt like when they were high school seniors visiting campus,” said Wade. “No one wants to feel like a burden. We want our guests to feel welcomed into the Wabash family from the moment they step on campus.”

As prospective students head into classrooms, wander the activities fair and settle into fraternity living rooms on Friday night, the hope is that they begin to picture themselves here — not just as visitors, but as future Wabash men.