50th Convention Update

If you're a blog reader, often you are privy to the latest information on PKT and what we're doing. This post is about something that we have not publicly announced yet so feel special to be getting the exclusive information.

This year we have embraced technology for the 50th Convention. You may know that we have a Phi Kappa Theta Twitter page, a YouTube where we post our videos, the Facebook page, and this blog but we have stepped up yet again. The newest rage is Event Tweets on Twitter. Confused? Get on Twitter and search #PKT50th and you'll find people's Twitter updates that are related to our 50th Convention. From now until Convention you'll see staff members updating the Twitter account and including #PKT50th in the update. That's called a hashtag and it's a way to organize posts. It allows multiple people to Tweet about the same topic and keep it in one place. Once Convention begins, any attendee at Convention will have the ability to add #PKT50th in their update if it's Convention related and people who are not attending can see live Twitter updates from Convention in Columbus. Pretty cool, huh!? So if you're going to Convention be sure to start your Convention related Tweets during your travels to Convention and use #PKT50th in or at the end of your tweet. If you're not attending - be sure to search #PKT50th on Twitter to follow status updates straight from the membership in attendance.

Member Spotlight: Russel Fisher; Pennsylvania Tau Colony Vice President

Some staff members here at the Executive Office utilize google alerts. These alerts tell us when our name is used online in news articles or press releases. Today I was sent the best google alert I've seen in a while and it compelled me to start something new on the blog - a Member Spotlight. Our members are often doing amazing things and being recognized in their community or across the country for their extraordinary efforts. Today, our first member spotlight is on Russel Fisher, a colony member of Pennsylvania Tau, St. Francis University. For those of you who read the blog often, you know that we work very closely with the colony and I have been there twice in the last year. Russel is the Vice President and is one of the most outstanding young men I have had the pleasure of working with. Here is a link to an article about Russel and his recent nomination to the 2009 Allstate/AFCA Good Works Team. Congratulations Russel!

http://www.tribune-democrat.com/sports/local_story_208234213.html

Mideast Regional Conference

MARK YOUR CALENDARS!

The Mideast Regional Leadership Conference will be held in Pittsburgh, September 18-20, 2009 and will be hosted by the Pennsylvania Alpha Xi chapter at Duquesne University. The President at Duquesne, alumnus Lenny Chan, and I have been working hard to secure room blocks, finalize the training schedule, select facilitators, and organize a very fun brotherhood outing for all attendees. The training will provide two separate training tracks on Friday night and Saturday; one will be the (iServe) Institute and the other will be for collegiate members. The two groups will converge on Sunday morning for training that was requested by both alumni and collegians. It's going to be a great Regional Conference that is being planned based on the needs and requests of members in the Mideast Region who responded to the survey which was sent in August. Tell your advisors, alumni, mentors, brothers, anybody who works with your collegiate chapter to mark their calendars for this weekend. More information, including cost and an agenda will be made public as soon as it's completed. Post a comment if you have questions about the event - we love to hear your thoughts!

My First Few Weeks on Staff

Alright, my first post as a Phi Kap staff member! I thought I would just briefly talk about my first few weeks on staff and my impressions so far as someone who is new to the organization. For those who I haven't met yet, my name is Gretchen and I'm the new Assistant Director of Member Development.

I've been officially in the office for three weeks now and have spent a big chunk of that time really learning about the fraternity. I've met with all the staff members, a board member, vendors, and spent hours reading every policy, document, Temple, and every nook and cranny of the website. I'd like to pretend I have it all figured out, but I'm learning more every day.

Everyone I've met has been extremely welcoming and also a lot of fun, but one of the things I've been most impressed with since I've been here is the strategic plan and vision for the organization.It is exciting and motivating as a staff member to help the fraternity move forward and to grow and it was one of the biggest reasons I was interested in this position. What I've learned even more since being on staff is that it isn't change simply for the sake of change, everyone has spent a lot of time reflecting on how to make Phi Kappa Theta and its membership the best that it can be. I find a lot of organizations have a vision and plan that are just for show, and that is definitely not the case here. Plus in my opinion, some really cool things will be in the works.

We are gearing up for convention here in the office currently and I'm excited to meet everyone who will be attending.I truly believe your stories and experiences will teach me much more about Phi Kappa Theta.My challenge for you all is,If you had to teach someone about Phi Kappa Theta what would you tell them? What are you proud of? I'd love to hear your answers!

Mission Accomplished

I could not be happier to announce that the Accreditation Application grading process is over. We spent all day, every day, for the last month reading these things and let me tell you it was quite an experience. I laughed, I cried, I smiled, I sighed and once or twice I even rolled my eyes. Overall, our chapters are doing some really good things which is always great to read about. I am so excited for the awards banquet at Convention to recognize these chapters and their hard work. We also have a lot of work to do before next year's Accreditation Application is released. We are putting this project through some changes and we start working on it in t-minus 11 days. Less writing, more clicking. The format will be even more user friendly and straight forward. I could not be more excited for Accreditation version 2.0.

In other exciting news, Gretchen Stahl, the new Assistant Director of Member Development, started this week. She keeps coming back so I guess it's safe to assume she likes it here so far. It's great to have her here and she really fits in with the rest of staff so well. Once Convention is over we'll have the time to start moving forward with some very exciting things we're working on for our membership. Fresh ideas, new and updated resources, and a Mideast Regional Conference this fall that everybody will want to attend.

Now for some business. Get excited for Convention because we are! We are doing some cool new things at Convention this year to celebrate 50 years of brotherhood. I am hoping we have record breaking attendance, but we have some chapters that have yet to register! Who are they, you ask? See below. Let's utilize mass accountability here to get them registered!

Belmont Abbey
Carnegie Mellon
Cincinnati
Detroit-Mercy
Georgia
Louisiana at Lafayette
Michigan Tech
Nebraska-Lincoln
New Orleans
Nicholls
Ohio University
Pittsburgh
South Dakota
St. Francis
St. Louis
Texas-Austin
Truman State
Washington State

Lost Greek Generation

This was sent to me today and it's all the buzz around my interfraternal friends Facebook pages. Thoughts?

Convention, Accreditation, and Life

I have several things to write on three different subjects so I'll will try to compartmentalize this.

50th Convention:
Keith and I love making videos. Since I started staff a year ago we have made several of them, with each getting better and better. My favorite was the last promo video for Convention with the exploding crests. The last 1/2 just blows my mind it's so cool. If you haven't seen it - you should.

So we just created a NEW one. It's the final promo for Convention and it might be my new favorite. Check it out and get excited for Convention!




Accreditation:
The results are in and out of our 44 active chapters (clearly this does not count colonies) we have 35 groups that submitted their Accreditation Packets. We had very few issues and we have already learned alot about the process and small things we can do for next year to make it even better. It's amazing that one year ago I was sitting here reading stacks of notebooks for awards and thought "Wow, we must make this easier and electronic" and now, it has happened. I can't wait to start reading everything. Thank you so much to all the people who assisted with the creation of the program and to all of our chapters for their patience and open communication. This is going to be great!

Music:
A new first for the blog - music. I love music. You might be surprised to learn that my current obsession is 311. A group I've never liked before but the new album "Uplifter" is great. I have one song on repeat that I listen to all day long. Catch these lyrics:

"...Chipping away, day by day, until we see it break apart - hear me talk about
Let it be known it can be done. Bit by bit and one by one.
If the both of us try from both of two sides, until we see the sun..."

If you take this out of context of the song (which I will now do) it makes me think of Greek Life and stereotypes. Just before this part of the chorus it references a heart surrounded by stone. If the heart is really all the people who hate Greek Life, and the stone wall around it are all the stereotypes, we need to chip away. All of us from every side should chip away. It's not easy and maybe one person can't realistically make a HUGE impact, but we can chip. If we all chip - all Phi Kaps, all fraternities and sororities, Greek Advisors, alumni, friends of Greeks; we can make a difference. Sometimes it takes work. Last night I was with friends and I was telling them about an upcoming Mario Kart competition that I must win. I've been practicing every night. My friend Jeremy asked me if I was having fun playing all these hours by myself just to win. I said, "It's not always about having fun, it's about being the best!" It's not easy, but often the rewards of our hard work make it worth everything. Sometimes the fun happens after the hard work. I'll have fun when I win this weekend. There's a time for both hard work and fun.