Fraternity and Sorority Life takes it to the streets for this year’s Greek Weekend.

Traditionally, FSL celebrated Greek Week in the fall, but because of a busy schedule and conflicting Jewish holidays, the celebration was moved to the spring. Greek Weekend consists of various events put on by FSL, begining April 9 and continuing until April 11.

For the first day, the Greek community shut down 15th and Kincaid to host the kick-off of a massive celebration.

Kelsey Fuson, Panhellenic vice presidednt of community programming, said the celebration hosted local Eugene food trucks and entertainers. FSL members had the choice of eating from Da Nang Eatery, Mondo Forcella, Red Five Hot Dog Company and Megan’s Snack Shack. Along with the food, members could get caricatures done of themselves, visit a magician or receive a henna tattoo.

FSL incorporated other community groups such as Relay for Life, Jam Squad and On The Rocks to top it all off.

Overall the event hosted over 1,ooo members.

“We were excited about the turn out. We had a lot of fun with local food carts and the student groups who participated,” Fuson said. “It was a great way to celebrate all the accomplishments of our chapters.”

FSL is continuing its Greek Weekend today by partnering with Womenspace to promote sexual assault awareness, and will be outside the EMU from 10-2 today.

Sigma Pi’s frat castle is now under new ownership of Sigma Nu.

Sigma Pi willingly left its mansion after reevaluating its budget and saw that keeping the house may eventually put the fraternity in debt, says Sigma Pi President Robert Mollusky.

Mollusky says 78 percent of the men’s dues were going to the house, and the chapter didn’t know if it could maintain those numbers for much longer. The chapter unanimously made the decision to become an unhoused fraternity in order to save money.

After the decision to leave the house was made, Mollusky says he immediately contacted former Sigma Nu president, Charlie Ekblad, to offer him the opportunity to become a housed fraternity.

Mollusky decided that Sigma Nu would be a perfect fit for the house because he knew its chapter had enough members to maintain the burdens of a house — especially one as big as Sigma Pi’s.

Since that time in January, Sigma Pi and Sigma Nu have been working together to make the transition of both chapters as easy as possible.

During week 10 of winter term, it was made official that Sigma Nu would be moving into the house.

Select members of Sigma Nu started moving into the house just days after they were officially confirmed for the house. The rest of the members to fill the house will move in this upcoming fall. In the meantime, the fraternity men are working diligently to furnish, clean and, most importantly, get Sigma Nu’s letters on the front of the house.

Being an unhoused fraternity on campus has its ups and downs, Sigma Nu President Patrick Poggi says, but the men of Sigma Nu are more than ready to officially transition to being a housed fraternity and reap all the benefits that come with it.

Poggi says that Sigma Nu and Sigma Pi have a great relationship and both fraternities are helping each other make the transition from housed to unhoused or vice versa.

“The entire time they (Sigma Pi) have been nothing but helpful. You know they’re excited about showing us different things about the house and how we can get accustomed to it, and different systems they have. We can’t thank them enough for striking that bond between the two houses,” Poggi said.

On the other hand, Sigma Pi is not getting nothing out of this deal. Mollusky says that Sigma Pi will be taking over some smaller live-out houses that members of Sigma Nu own. This will allow Sigma Pi to have a central place to meet.

Members of both houses will have to get accustomed to the new way of living, but with the help from each chapter, the transition should be virtually painless.

Sigma Nu is happy to finally have a house after being on campus since 2009-2010. Poggi says they are in the right place to take on a house and they couldn’t be more excited.

“A lot of things still need to happen,” Poggi says. It was the right fit, and it just worked out really well. We’re so lucky and so privileged that Sigma Pi was there to help us there through this.”

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On her last day of of school ever, graduating senior Victoria Perley ran down to the Union Market after hearing that they were giving away free food — a great ending to her time at the UO.

The Union Market shut down Thursday because of renovation work, two days earlier than planned. Students coming through Union Market took all the free food, candy and drinks they could during the final moments of the market.

The original plan to got rid of all the excess inventory was to do a 50 percent off sale Thursday and Friday, but because of a problem with the internal sewers and a storm drain clean out, they were forced to close the market today, said Shelly Puitt, food service coordinator.

“We decided to do this after we took inventory and saw what was left. It’s the cost of doing business when you end things up,” Pruitt said.

Students were informed of this last-minute decision on Facebook, and word of mouth spread it even further. All who came were allowed to take what they could carry, just as long as they were mindful of those who were still waiting to take their share.

Pruitt says it is a great way to give back to the students.

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The excitement of new members, homecoming and Greek Week wasn’t the same this year for Oregon Fraternity and Sorority Life. FSL made many changes to their events schedule this year, the biggest being recruitment and Greek Week.

Fraternity and Sorority Life moved Greek Week to spring term so that it would not conflict with two major Jewish holidays, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

Greek Week is when the whole Greek community gets together to celebrate through multiple competitions. Vice President of Community Programs for the Interfraternity Council said that it usually includes things such as participation in the homecoming parade, photo competitions and a final dance competition.

Vice President of Recruitment for the Interfraternity Council, Cameron Parker said that this year fall formal recruitment for sororities was pushed back to week two of the term (as opposed to the usual week one), and because of that Greek Week would need to be pushed back to week three. With the dates being different, it conflicted with two major Jewish holidays.

IFC President Max Lehman said that Greek Week would have been during those holidays, and having a celebration not related to the Jewish holiday seemed wrong to Fraternity and Sorority Life.

“It would have been somewhat inappropriate to have a joyous recruitment event on a day like that,” Lehman said.

In addition, Lehman says that in the past Greek Week dates have discouraged some from joining their community.

“In the past it actually discouraged some Jewish women from going through the recruitment process,” Lehman said.

Overall the decision to move Greek Week to the spring was to respect as many people as possible.

“It was kind of unfair to have a Jewish fraternity on campus and not respect the most holy days of their year,” Lehman said. “It was worth it to respect the high holidays.”

Now with a drastic change of date, Greek Week will be “Greek Weekend,” held Apil 9th 10th and 11th, and participants can see many changes to the celebration that is being implemented this year.

Andrew Weiss, Vice President of Community Programs for The Interfraternity Council says that this year’s event will include a block party, a field day, photo contest, sexual assault prevention presentations, and a community service event day.

“This year we’re focusing on making sure everyone is going to have fun with this event, and it’s a chance for the Greek community to come together more,” Weiss said.

Some who are familiar with Greek Week celebrations may expect a dance competition between the sororities and fraternities, but Weiss said that event has been cut due to the fact that Delta Gamma’s philanthropy, Anchor Splash, which includes a large-scale dance competition will be held spring term.

The new format for Greek Week is not set in stone, but is a good opportunity for the Greek community to try something new.

“We’re looking forward to changing things up this year,” Weiss said.

The post Where did Greek Week go? appeared first on Emerald Media.

Unchartered fraternities might not be allowed to charter if Fraternity and Sorority Life growth is suspended, but without a clear answer on whether or not they’ll be allowed, they’re forging on anyway.

The possibility of suspending the growth of FSL has been drawing nearer. When a resolution passed to immediately suspend FSL if a spring campus climate survey did not show a decline in sexual assault victims within the community, members worried what would happen if the suspension were to happen – especially those who are part of organizations that are not yet chartered.

Justin Shukas, director of FSL has assured the president of one unchartered fraternity that they will be allowed to charter if a suspension occurs. However, according to ASUO Senator Andrew Lubash, that decision will be a case-by-case basis for each chapter made by the university.

Currently there are three fraternities on campus that are not chartered: Alpha Tau Omega, Delta Upsilon and Theta Chi. This means that they are not fully recognized by the university or the Interfraternity Council. This leaves a grey area as far as suspension goes – will these chapters be allowed to charter if a suspension happens, or will they be forced to forgo chartering another year? Members of Alpha Tau Omega and Delta Upsilon say they’re not in support of a suspension and not sure what would happen if one occurs.

“(Suspension) would leave us in a weird limbo area where we could potentially have the support of the IFC, but I don’t know if we would necessarily have the support from the university,” Alpha Tau Omega President Gustavo Feria said.

Feria said that ATO is hopeful and excited to make a difference in their community when it comes to sexual assault no matter if they charter or not.

“As far as ATO stands I feel like we all as an organization feel that the most important thing is preventing sexual assault,” Feria said.

On the other hand, Delta Upsilon is in the works of chartering this coming spring term. Because they are so close to chartering, they do not fear the personal side effects of a suspension.

Junior DU member Brandon Brezic says that his biggest concern is if you don’t allow new chapters on campus, the current chapters will become overwhelmingly large and won’t be able to regulate members as well.

Brezic says that when chapters become too big it’s hard to have a close relationship with every member, and members can easily fall through the cracks. This can directly correlate to more members in FSL being victims of sexual assault. Brezic says that the solution is the exact opposite as to what the Senate is proposing – expand the number of chapters, which will decrease the number of members in every house.

Lubash, who created the resolution to suspend the growth of FSL, says in response to Brezic that his opinion has not been backed by facts, and is irresponsible.

“If chapters cannot control their members, maybe they shouldn’t have so many members,” Lubash said.

The gray area for unchartered fraternities has not been resolved, and will not be until the university decides to make a decision on the resolution passed by senate. Until then chapters will continue to gain members in hopes to charter sooner than later.

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“Fraternities have a terrible public image,” Cameron Parker said. “But the new system is going to change that.”

Parker is vice president of recruitment for the Interfraternity Council, and he and others are working to change IFC’s recruitment model this spring to improve that image.

In the past, IFC chapters ran their rush events will little help from the university or IFC head.

“There was no recruitment structure whatsoever,” Parker said. “Every chapter did their own recruitment by themselves.”

Following the hiring of a director for Fraternity and Sorority Life, Justin Shukas, fraternities were finally able to have some formal support and structure to the recruitment process.

With the help of Shukas, Parker is better able to assist all fraternities when it comes to recruitment. This is what led to a semi-formalized structure that will be implemented in the next upcoming rush.

For the first time ever, all fraternities that will be participating in that term’s rush will be required to attend an event where all potential new members will go and have the opportunity to learn about that chapters values.

Not only does this ensure a more values-based recruitment, but it also allows all PNM’s to get to know every chapter, Shukas said – not just the largest chapters with houses.

“The biggest switch in recruitment we’ve made is that we’ve really hit hard that we want the fraternities to recruit on their values and mission statements that they set up, learned through the pledge and said they would always remain true to themselves,” Parker said.

These events will allow for PNMs to learn about the chapter’s value, decide what values they recognize within themselves and can make a decision of which chapter they want to rush from there.

IFC President Max Lehman and Parker say that this new standard will show Oregon’s community what fraternity life is all about.

“It’s trying to get away from the atmosphere of ‘Greek Life is just a social aspect’,” Lehman said.

Ensuring that the fraternity’s values are at the core of its recruitment will enable the community to recruit members who will continue to add positives to these organizations. In order to get away from problems in FSL, Parker says they have to recruit members who want to help.

“We’re trying to stop the problems in our community,” Parker said. “Sexual violence, fraternity stereotypes and overall a terrible image for our community.”

This process will be effective by getting the rush chairs for each chapter involved and excited about the process, according to Parker.

Sigma Nu’s rush chair, Kevin Mertz, says the most exciting part of this new process is its ability to bring in more people to Fraternity and Sorority Life.

“I’m excited for the type of people that could come out, I think it could draw a more diverse group of people,” Mertz said. “Promoting this community feeling could bring a lot more people in, and that can benefit the chapter.”

Starting this new model will help FSL combat any negatives that may come to its community.

“In order to have a safe, productive and good community, you have to rush those members,” Lehman said

Overall, fraternities have accepted the idea of switching the way in which they recruit.

“Everyone has been supporting the idea of a values based recruitment 100 percent,” Lehman said.

Having all men who are involved in this process supportive of it will be key to ensuring the success of the newly formalized process.

“I don’t think I’m prepared if we don’t get the quality guys because I’m just so certain that we’re all on the same page and that’s the biggest difference,” Parker said.

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Fraternity and Sorority Life is facing a large amount of scrutiny within Oregon’s community.

In a time when expansion may seem scary, Alpha Tau Omega, Oregon’s newest fraternity, sees it as the perfect opportunity to redefine what a fraternity is.

Alpha Tau Omega left the University of Oregon in the early 2000s during a time when the university and FSL were going through changes and looking to start fresh, ATO’s expansion consulant Jeff Hazelrigs said.

Oregon has become increasingly popular among prospective students, and the increasing number of students joining FSL make it the perfect time for ATO to be back on campus.

“It’s a good time for Greek Life here,” Hazelrigs said. “I think they’re experiencing a lot of growth with more students choosing Fraternity and Sorority Life as they come to campus, but also more organizations wanting to come here as well.”

In response to the growth, Hazelrigs and his expansion partner, Bo Hunter, are taking this seemingly difficult time for FSL to remind people of the good that it can do.

“It’s changed a lot of our conversation here. We talk a lot about what fraternity could be instead of what they see in us,” Hazelrigs said. “It’s showing that we want to know more about you and how we can better help you get to where you want to be and have some fun along the way, too.”

Others in Oregon’s community do not agree that now is the best time for new fraternities to come to campus.

“As a senator to prevent sexual violence on campus, I’m concerned that we are growing an institution that has been proven to lead to higher rates of rape and sexual assault,” Andrew Lubash, Student Senator said.

One of ATO’s newest founding fathers, Adam Moran, never saw himself in a social fraternity until he heard that ATO was giving him the opportunity to redefine what fraternity is.

“I like that this opportunity allows for us to reshape what a fraternity is,” Moran said. “We can build what we want to see, and I’m really excited to do that.”

Knowing that now is a difficult time for Oregon’s FSL system has not affected men joining ATO.

“I think there’s going to be a lot of work ahead because the reputation of fraternity is pretty shattered,” Moran said. “I just kind of took a leap of faith knowing that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Moran and Hazelrigs are looking forward to spreading Alpha Tau Omega’s values

Additional founding father, Carlos Padilla, says that now is a perfect time to bring new chapters to Oregon as long as they’re chapters committed to good. Padilla believes that ATO is one of those chapters.

“People are influencing their brothers in the wrong way (in other fraternities), the chapter we are trying to start is a more positive influence towards society and community, Padilla said.

As expansion consultants, Hazelrigs and Hunter have the fun job of making new fraternities all over the country with the emphasis of leadership in every one. Each fraternity is unique and a byproduct of the founding fathers.

“This is their organization, so we empower them to make the changes that they want to see,” Hazelrigs said.

The opportunity to be the deciding factor in what the new fraternity will be is a great opportunity for Oregon men.

“It’s a great time to talk about why our organizations exist and the purpose behind them,” Hazelrigs said.

ASUO Senate passed an amended version of the resolution calling Interim President Scott Coltrane to suspend the expansion of Fraternity and Sorority Life on Feb. 18. The resolution was passed in response to statistics from a campus climate survey conducted by University of Oregon professor Jennifer Freyd that indicate disproportionate numbers of sexual assault within FSL.

The amendment that ASUO passed added a stipulation that expansion would halt if sexual assault did not decrease by spring 2015, when the next campus climate survey on sexual assault will be released.

Senate deliberated on the resolution for over three hours at its previous meeting on Feb. 11, and discussion continued on Feb. 18 for another three hours. Senators proposed multiple amendments to the resolution, which all involved delaying the halt of expansion.

Senate ultimately decided to pass the resolution with an amendment from Senator Andrew Lubash that would delay halting FSL expansion until spring 2015. In the meantime, other parts of the resolution state other ways in which FSL will work internally to decrease the numbers of sexual assault including deferring recruitment for one term so it doesn’t coincide with fall term’s “red zone,” when students are particularly vulnerable to sexual assault.

Gerlinger 304 was filled with members of FSL and other University of Oregon community members who voiced their opinions about the subject.

Despite differences among individuals at the meeting, all agreed that sexual assault needs to stop immediately.

“One is too many,” Assistant Director of Fraternity and Sorority Life, Mallory Wehage said.

All agreed with her statement, but the way to resolve that was split.

One of the first comments came from Zach Lusby, member of Delta Tau Delta, who challenged Senate to pass the resolution. He said that by being so reluctant to halt growth, members of FSL are not as committed to combatting sexual assault as they claim to be.

Members of newly colonized fraternity Alpha Tau Omega referenced their own experiences in saying that new FSL organizations bring more opportunities for leadership at the university, and that with more leaders they can better combat sexual assault.

The resolution passed 12-4.

Following an almost four-hour long senate meeting Wednesday, Feb. 11, leaders in Fraternity and Sorority Life realized the need to be more present in working with the resolution presented by Andrew Lubash to the Senate.

Lubash is a student senate member and a key player in motivating people. He wants to suspend the expansion of FSL for a year after a survey conduced by Jennifer Freyd showed that sorority women are 3.4 times more likely to become victims of sexual assault. Lubash created a resolution stating the needs for suspending FSL, in hopes the senate will pass it and make the university take action faster.

After many opinions presented by various UO students, staff and faculty were presented regarding the resolution. FSL leaders saw a great need for being more involved in the wording of the resolution. Lubash encouraged everyone who wanted to be involved to attend meetings to set a resolution.

Today, Lubash hosted his first FSL sexual assault working group with various FSL and senate members to create a resolution that all feel comfortable with.

Lubash asked IFC and PHC presidents what their ideal world would look like in terms of sexual assault prevention as it relates to FSL. Both members agreed that support to implement working programs to combat sexual violence would be ideal.

PHC president, Rebecca Brennan, said that continued assessment of programs increased learnining and accountability. Together, these will be factors that help with prevention efforts.

IFC president Max Lehman agrees and wants more knowledge on how to be better leaders for sexual assault prevention.

“What I would like to see is more support in the programming field,” Lehman said. “My ideal world is trying to get that support from trained professionals who know how to do successful programming and know how to implement it.”

Lehman also stressed the need for experiential learning in their community to better teach members how to combat sexual violence.

Lubash and leaders in FSL both want different outcomes when it comes to the final voting of the resolution — Lubash wants it to pass and FSL leaders do not. During the working group, this was not addressed. The meeting was to ensure involvement of all effected by the resolution.

After about an hour long discussion about change needed for the resolution, seven new points were added.

Points included: FSL sexual assault prevention task force review IFC and PHC policies to identify any possible changes that could improve sexual assualt prevention efforts, increased funding for sexual assault prevention efforts, controlled campus climate survey specific to FSL members, experiential programming, explore the idea of differed IFC and PHC recruitment, and to hold the administration more accountable in handling issues of sexual violence.

Although all added issues have the opportunity to stay on the resolution, senate has the ability to strike sections if they feel the need to.

“Senate can just strike things they don’t like,” Lubash said. “If it doesn’t have a majority (voted by senate) to be killed, it will just stay. When we’re done, senate will just vote on the whole thing.”

Leaders in FSL want to be more involved in this issue in order to best tackle it. Being present for the wording of the resolution is just one of many efforts that leaders in the community will show their dedication to preventing sexual assault in FSL.

Delta Tau Delta has had the highest grades in Fraternity and Sorority Life for 17 terms. But they’re also on probation for a drugging that happened in their house last spring, and that has changed the way their fraternity operates for the better, leaders think.

Now more than ever, the university is holding Fraternity and Sorority Life accountable for their actions, and leaders in DTD want to follow by holding their members accountable for their actions, studies and behavior.

DTD was put on probation in the spring of 2014 because of incidents at a party, according to sophomore internal vice president Austin Thompson.

That spring, the fraternity held a party that let in an unknown individual who was not on the guest list. That individual drugged another member of the party, according to Thompson, causing DTD to make many sudden changes in the past year.

Although the individual who brought the illegal substances to the party was not a member of the fraternity, the fraternity’s nationals and the university believed that the house needed to be put on probation.

DTDa’s alcohol probation now prohibits any drinking at their house, and does not allow for more than five fraternity members to be together while drinking.

DTD had the highest grades in fall 2014, but that’s just a small portion of their winnings. According to FSL statistics, with the exception of spring 2014, DTD has been leading the pack with grades since the fall of 2009.

President Sam Selbie attributes this success to their ability to hold each other accountable, and the drive that the men in their house have. Selbie says that joining DTD was a refreshing surprise.

“I found an environment I wasn’t expecting; that was one of academic support and promoting leadership,” Selbie said.

The fraternity has many different measures that they will put in place with members who are not meeting their overall 2.7 GPA requirement to ensure that the house remains the leader for academics.

The probation hasn’t hurt recruitment of DTD, Lubash said. It has actually brought better quality people into the fraternity.

“I don’t think it hindered our recruiting at all; it actually may have helped,” senior Andrew Lubash said. “When we recruit, we don’t want to recruit people who are just going to join a fraternity in order to party.”

Lubash says that all men interested in joining DTD are made fully aware of their sanctions.

The organization made presentations to their whole chapter (and the general public) about two main topics: alcohol and substance abuse, and sexual assault awareness.

These topics aim to better educate the fraternity as a whole about some of the biggest issues in their communities.

“The presentations that we do have really started to change the culture in our house. We are talking openly about substance abuse and sexual assault. We are looking to become a leader about those issues,” Thompson said.

Selbie said that probation doesn’t have to define a chapter; it can hold them accountable and gives them the opportunity to grow —  Selbie hopes that DTD is the model for that.

“I don’t want to promote the idea that we’re better (than other fraternities) – we’re definitely not,” Selbie said. “All fraternities have their strengths and weaknesses. Our goal is to promote an attitude of growth and  self-improvement.”