Grant Sikes

Sikes grew up in Cullman, Alabama.[1] As a student at the University of Alabama,[2] Sikes decided to go through formal recruitment for National Panhellenic Conference sororities.[3] She documented her experiences going through recruitment on her TikTok, where she gained hundreds of thousands of followers and millions of views.[4] Sikes, alongside other Alabama students such as Kylan Darnell, became internet famous as the recruitment process became an online sensation known as Bama Rush.[5] Sikes was dropped from seventeen of the nineteen National Panhellenic Conference sororities after the first day of formal recruitment,[6][7] leaving Kappa Alpha Theta and Gamma Phi Beta as the two sororities still interested in offering her a bid for membership.[8] Sikes was ultimately not offered a bid for membership in any of the sororities and alleged that this was due to her being non-binary.[1][9] According to the Alabama Panhellenic Association, "any student who consistently lives and self-identifies as a woman" can go through formal recruitment, but the sororities could individually discriminate based on gender identity and presentation.[10]

After receiving negative media attention for her participation in Bama Rush, and being called a "biological man" and queerphobic slurs by members of the sororities, Sikes came out as a transgender woman.[3] She stated that she was outed as transgender by media outlets before publicly coming out on her own terms.[1][11]