Time to get ready for Grand Marshal Week. It sounds great huh, lots of fun, events going on, and time for the great spring weather to start. Grand Marshal week is also time for elections. The Grand Marshal, President of the Union, class presidents, class vice president, class senators, and Independent Council are all up for elections. I hope many people consider running for these positions since the more people that we have involved in student government, the stronger it becomes.
In the Interfraternity Council, we are going to do our part during this time. In the next general assembly meeting, April 3, the IFC is inviting all candidates for the Grand Marshal and President of the Union positions to come and give a three-minute speech to the general assembly. After hearing all of the candidates give speeches, the IFC will vote to endorse the best candidate for each position. Please get involved in student government; be active on the issues that concern you.
In other recent news, some of the Interfraternity Council and Panhellenic members attended the Northeast Greek Leadership Association’s annual meeting in Philadelphia. This year the IFC was not lucky enough to pull off any awards, but we’re certain next year we will snare a couple. We are surely headed in the right direction for the next year. This can be shown by looking at our own Travis Apgar who has been the head of greek life in the Dean of Students Office.
Since Dean Apgar has taken office he has continually been an integral part of greek life. He has supported greek life continuously and pushed for ways that greeks can become more respected on campus. With the proven-strong leadership he provides we commend him for coming away with a very distinctive Philippi Outstanding Advisor award in the NGLA awards this year. With his leadership the IFC has flourished under his support. The IFC has become very organized and now up for several NGLA awards in the coming year.
If the IFC remains on the current path of putting forth strong initiatives for our greek community there should be several awards we will be eligible to win for next year’s NGLA awards. These awards cover areas such as leadership, recruitment, multicultural, philanthropy and community service, public relations, risk management, and academic achievement. In the future if we begin to win these awards it shows to the rest of the local community and the greek community that greeks on RPI’s campus are innovators and leaders.
Aside from having awards for the overall greek council there are also several awards up for grabs every year within our own IFC. These are the Awards of Excellence awarded by the Dean of Students Office. These awards cover all aspects of greek life ranging in areas of academics, recruitment, community service, chapter management, social responsibility, IFC participation, and athletics. These awards help your chapter gain notoriety and allow incoming freshmen to see what kind of active chapters are out there. As a reminder, the Awards of Excellence are due this April 1. If you are interested in applying for any of these awards, the criteria can be e-mailed to you by writing an e-mail to ifc@rpi.edu. The applications can also be picked up in the Dean of Students office on the fourth floor of the Troy building.
