Greek Pride Sweeps the Campus as the Greek Organizations Compete in Events
One thing that every fraternity and sorority looks forward to each year, aside from the formals and various social events, is the University’s an-nual Greek Week. The event was held last week from Monday, April 9 to Sunday, April 15.
Greek Week is one week of the school year when all fraternities and sororities participate in a series of events each day of the week. The activities range from dodge-ball and tug-of-war to talent shows and aca-demic challenges focusing on Greek Life’s four core values: leadership, scholarship, service, brotherhood and sisterhood.
Assistant Director of Student Activities for Fraternity and Soror-ity Life, Tyler Havens, scheduled the venues for each event and the students of the Greek Senate Executive Board put together the events and The game rules.
The Greek Senate is comprised of eight students representing eight different organizations: President Megan Tracey of Zeta Tau Alpha; Vice President Chris Mills of Sigma Pi; Chief Justice Amanda DeMaio of Phi Sigma Sigma; Treasurer Rosario Pucci of Theta Xi; Administrative Assistant Caitlyn Dwyer of Alpha Xi Delta; Chief Interfraternity Council Officer Andre Renaudo of Tau Kappa Epsilon; Chief Panhellenic Council Officer Kaitlyn McMenamin of Delta Phi Epsilon and Chief Multicultural Greek Council Officer Tina Onikoyi of Lambda Theta Alpha Latin Sorority, Inc.
This year’s Greek Life schedule of events included a talent show on Monday, bag toss and dodge ball on Tuesday, Greek Feud on Wednesday, Academic Challenge on Thursday, Relay for Life on Friday, a cardboard boat race and volleyball on Saturday and lastly track and field events on Sunday.
“It was fun. I liked dodge ball and volleyball,” said Senior, Lara Swan.
Monday through Thursday, the Greeks also had Penny Wars to raise money for the West End Fire Relief Fund. They have currently raised over $700.
In previous years, Greek Week events have consisted of a can castle building contest, beach clean-ups, billiards and a mechanical bull-rid-ing competition. Some of the events are based on that year’s theme. The theme this year was 90’s Television, which they incorporated in some of the events.
“I think that Gree Week is a big tradition for our campus,” said Havens.
All of the events were held on campus with consideration of the cost. The Greek Senates budget is allocated through the Student Government Association where about $1,500 is put into Greek Week alone each year out to Havens.
Planning for Greek Week begins in October, but a lot of it is based on when they can get the venues, which they begin looking for in May of the previous year.
“It’s a domino effect of what’s go-ing to determine the week,” said Havens.
By late November or early December, the Greek Senate has an idea of what Greek Week will consist of and by mid-February everything is finalized. Usually Greek Week falls in April.
“Students prefer to wait until all new members are initiated,” said Havens.
Since Relay for Life also fell at the same time as Greek Week, they did not have one more athletic day that they usually have. Most years, they had basketball in addition to volleyball, but not as many fraternities and sororities were participating in Relay as well.
“Not only are we asking people to be involved in what we are doing,” said Havens, “We are also getting in-volved in a major campus event.”
There were also a lot of non-affil-iated students who came to Greek the first event of the week, was the most popular event this year, bringing in 450 people to Pollak Theatre.
“The creativity the students put into it is wonderful,” said Havens.
A lot of alumni came back for Greek Week as well, particularly during the weekend events. Many former Greeks who are now gradu-ate students went to watch the events after their classes. “All of the events are open to the public to come and watch,” said Havens.
Even administrators and students and donated towards Penny Wars. “We want to also give back to our community so we keep Penny Wars to something local,” said Havens.
Some other fundraisers that fraternities and sororities have done this jockey competition in Anacon Hall the first week of school for the Adopt-ed Saint Jude’s Children’s Hospital. They held a charity basketball game as well, where they donated $3,500 to the hospital from their fundraising ef-to the Safe Harbor house.
“It’s very tiring,” said Havens. “The amount of work they have put into it shows their dedication to their campus and their community.”
Out of the fraternities and sororities on campus, this year 14 teams participated in Greek Week since this year’s newest addition, co-ed Business fraternity, Alpha Kappa Psi, had to have the men and women compete separately, but both teams got the same amount of points for each activ-ity they won.
“They try to maintain the support within the brotherhood,” said Havens.
Sophomore, Katelyn Viola found that some of the activities took a long time, causing her to be bored at times. “It could be better,” said Viola. “A lot of the time we are just sitting around waiting for things tog o on.”
Despite Greek Life students not being required to participate in the events, they often would find some way for everyone to be a part of them, even if that meant being a referee or a all of our groups participate,” said Havens. “We want everyone to partici-pate and we will find a way for everyone to participate and be a part of it.”
Although the students mainly manage the events, Havens supervises each activity to make sure everything goes smoothly. Each of the events had about 100 to 200 students activicely involved, which often times results in some “procedural errors” as Havens puts it
“There’s always going to be issues,” said Havens.
“Sometimes chapters get in the heat of the moment with un-sportsmanlike conduct.”
Many students take the events very seriously, holding tryouts and utilizing intramurals as their training. The most exciting event tends to be tug-o-war because it is the last event of Greek Week. This year the tug-of-war was won by Tau Kappa Epsilon for the mens bracket and Alpha Sigma for the womens.
“I think that the students have a good time with it,” said Havens. “I know they look forward to it every year.”
Although there are no prizes for winning these events to take home, the winner’s names do get put on a trophy, which is displayed in the trophy case on the first floor of the Rebecca Stafford Student Center. The overall winner for Greek Week has yet to be announced. The results are still pending from Relay for Life.
“The idea of Greek Week is for people to come together,” said Havens. “It’s nice to see all the chapters in one place.”
Out of the 640 students registered within the University’s greek system, 575 of them are actively engaged in Greek Life and every year they are all invited to participate in Greek Week. As Greek Week continues to become a success, all are encouraged to attend next year’s events.
PHOTO COURTESY of Erin Smith
