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Monday, February 29, 2016

LIFE

I honestly do not know how to explain the experience of NGLA without going on and on and on and on because theres just so much to say !!!!
I enjoyed how this conference can be applied to not only Greek life but LIFE in general. I learned that doing something you love is worth more than being in a field that you're only in for the money ..I learned that women empowerment can go a long way .. I learned that having values is one thing but having actions with those values makes it easier to live up to...I learned that your actions truly do speak louder than any voice (even mine) and that those actions can represent your entire community and organization... I learned that when your priorities align with reality then life is much more easier..
I learned so much more but I don't want to bore you all with all the good juicy stuff I learned...

But I do want to tell a quick story,
At NGLA, they had sponsors (people who paid maaaad money to be there) to talk about different things they had to offer ; for example a guy who does composites was there telling us the deals and stuff like that ... get it ? ok good !
So anyways, I am just walking around with Mary, stalling before our next session stalls and we head over to the "Campus speaks" table. This table had all the speakers who were presenting and these speakers talk about their experiences...life and all that good stuff...
So back to story, we walk up to the table and we meet a nice guy named Jeremy. So Jeremy and I start talking while Mary is looking at the table stuff...
As I am talking to Jeremy I noticed that he was really really REALLY close to me as he is talking and was a bit confused ...I asked what he talks about when he does his talks and he explained to be that he was diagnosed with being legally blind 5 years ago . At first I was really confused because we had a full conversation before he stated that and he shook my hand with no problem.. confused I asked him what was he able to see and he explained that he only has his peripheral vision. This obviously shocked me. As we got deeper into the conversation, I asked how he got through such a difficult time and GUESS WHAT HE SAID......HIS FRATERNITY BROTHERS. His brothers give him rides wherever he needs and give him the support he needs to get him through the day.
I don't wanna tell you this story to make you sad but I tell you in hopes that we all have someone a sister or not to call when something difficult arises. I hope that we all have at least ONE sister/brother we can call if we need anything because thats what sisterhood is all about !!!!!!!!!

Well, that's all from me , GOODNIGHT EVERYONE !
ps: rarely get in my emotions but I actually miss the NGLA 2016 squad

Reflection Time

As I arrive home from our NGLA trip, I have several feelings present at once. The first feeling is nostalgia, for I am missing the sessions, conversations, and connections already. My other feeling, however, is that of excitement! I am extremely eager to be able to meet back up with our Greek community and share all of the wonderful information I have gained over the weekend, and I hope using this information will help us better our community and unite us even further. I have several takeaways from this trip, probably more than everyone wants to hear, so I will try to summarize them into three main points:

1. You need to work with the Greek members in your community from where they are at:
    As leaders of the BSU Greek community, we all have this strong passion and desire to improve           every aspect of our community that we can in hopes to better it for future members. This is an             great goal to have, however in order to do so, we need the support and assistance of the other               Greek members. With that said, in order to gain that support and get them involved in bettering our     community, we need to ask for help in a reasonable, fair manner. We cannot ask someone who has     been very little involved to make a 180 and be participating in every single event, meeting, etc.          This is asking too much and setting members up for failure. I instead, we can provide them with          simple, actionable goals to achieve. It could be as small as asking them to attend the new member      education program for one hour during their meeting to introduce themselves and get to know the        new members of our community. It could be as simple as asking them to help a committee hang          flyers around campus, or help them pickup trash for an hour. If we provide our members with              achievable, manageable tasks, it will be easier to gain their support and assistance. From this I can      roll into my next point,which is about how to be an effective leader of our members and                      community.

2. There are three key elements to being an effective leader, which are: creating actionable goals,     accountability, and communication. Like I said in my first point, we need to create goals with         reflect the values we connect with in our organizations, but make them actually achievable. We all     talk about the things we need to do and the goals we wish to achieve, but rarely do we put them           into action. By creating actionable statements, we outline for ourselves the goals we have and            exactly how to achieve them. An example is " I plan to strive for good scholarship and maintain a        high GPA by completing an extra hour of studying everyday". This statement identifies the goal:        represent the value of good scholarship and academics, and how you would achieve it: do an extra      hour of studying everyday. These statements can help us improve ourselves and achieve a high            standard of living like we all as Greeks have devoted ourselves to do. Accountability is very                important as a leader. Not only do you need to hold your members accountable for their actions and    make sure they are acting by our standards, but you more importantly need to hold yourself                  accountable. We cannot be good leaders if we do not hold ourselves to a higher standard. We need      to act just as our values state, because if we cannot stand by those values and act accordingly, why      would our members? Along with this, if our actions and behaviors aren't what they should be, we        lose our credibility as leaders and members will not take our role seriously. Communication is also      very important because it is how we create those actionable goals, how we hold each other                  accountable, and how we praise/interact with our members. As a leader it is essential to give credit      where it is due; members need to be acknowledged for their hardwork and their achievements              inside and outside the organization. Membership comes with support, and if we do not give that to      our members, we are missing a big piece of what sisterhood/brotherhood is. A helpful acronym to      create these communication statements is "FBI: feeling, behavior, impact". An example would be,     "I feel proud when you come early to the event to help set up, it really shows the support you have      for your sisters and makes them feel appreciated". These statements can help members feel valued      for their work and involvement in our organizations, and this can help us maintain a tight knit              community and strong bonds between our members. This leads into my final key point, which is        about membership and retaining our members.

3. Greek members have different ideas of brotherhood/sisterhood, and we need to acknowledge     every individual members perspectives, making sure they feel connected to the organization and     truly feel that bond of brotherhood/sisterhood. Members can all have different personalities and           different reasons for joining. Some join to become a part of a bigger movement on campus and join     the common purpose, some join to gain the support and encouragement of others, some join for the     higher standard of living and accountability, some join to have a sense of belonging on campus.          Whatever the case may be, every single members has some specific reason for joining that is              important to them, and we need to make sure we can cater to that so they receive the most out of the    membership experience and so they feel the strong bonds of sisterhood/brotherhood during their          time in the organization. Helping the members gain what they are looking for in their organization,    whether it was someone to motivate and support them during a tough semester, or someone who          shares the same philanthropic goals, our job as leaders is to make sure members feel like they found    those valuable things in their organizations, and that they stay in them because they found what          they were looking for. If this happens, these members too will eventually not focus on what they        can gain, but more on how they can help members find what they are looking for, just like we did        for them. This can help us better retain our members, and strengthen those bonds within our                community.

There is so much more information I gained from having the opportunity to attend this conference. I feel like I have been given new tools to make an impact on our members, and to gain their support to help our community to continually grow in a positive direction. With that said, I need to express my thanks and gratitude to a few people. Thank you to President Fred Clark and Vice President Jason Pina for your support and assistance to make this trip possible, Without it, we would have not been able to attend this amazing conference and be able to bring back all these tools on how to better our Greek community on campus. I also want to say thank-you to the other ten members of the BSU delegation that attended the conference with me. I am so grateful that I was able to bond with you all over the weekend, and that we all share a common interest in bettering our community. I am glad we have the support of one another to make these changes a reality on campus and are able to rely on one another whenever necessary. You are all great leaders and I am proud to know you and work with you all. My final thank-you is a very important one. Thank you to the amazing leader of student leaders, Maribeth. MB, I am so appreciative of everything you do for our Greek community at BSU. Without your dedication, conferences such as NGLA, and other growing and improving opportunities would not be possible. Your never ending support and passion for our organizations and community continuously motivates me to always try to improve my own abilities as a leader, and you stand as an example to all of us of what it looks like to be a phenomenal leader. Thank you for all that you do for BSU Greek Life, I appreciate it so much and it does not go unnoticed.

As I return into my routine on campus, I am full of ideas that I am ready to share and put into action. I am grateful to have been chosen to attend this conference, and it is one of the many experiences I have had during my time at BSU that makes me so proud to be a member of Greek Life,


An Introvert... Re-Energized

Even though Bridgewater isn’t as exciting as Pittsburg, I’m beyond proud to be a bear. I didn’t expect to be so impacted by this weekend, but I genuinely can say I’ve left NGLA motivated and inspired. Being an introvert, usually large meetings and conferences drain me. NGLA somehow re-energized me and brought me back to my positive mindset towards my time at BSU because it reminded me why I do the things I do; to impact, inspire, and push others to excellence.


My main takeaways:

1.      Start with me. Focusing on my own wellbeing before trying to push others. You can’t pour from an empty cup. I also will be challenging my own doubtful or negative thoughts whenever I face a challenge. It’s through the “mastery of hardships that you find happiness”.

2.      Share the bigger picture. Emphasize the vision of Alpha Sigma Tau through current chapter activities- strategically plan each chapter activity to address one of the following areas of growth: ethical, cultural, social, or professional development of members.

3.      Strengthen the Community. The re-chartering of Order of Omega (OOO) last year created a place for Greeks with a high standard of leadership to unite. I aim to build further upon this unity and strengthen it to a place where OOO members can openly discuss ideas and issues across the Greek Lines.           Networking of my own at NGLA has allowed me to connect with other OOO members and share ideas of programs that have worked and hear stories of things that failed. I can’t wait to aid the chapter in rebuilding our accountability system and bring useful resources I got at NGLA to our members.

Don't tell Marco to pretend that he likes me while taking a picture. This happens...


In all actuality, it was awesome getting to bond with fellow Greek Bears. Building connections is a crucial part of undergrad, and I've build some lasting friendships. I can't wait to partner with these amazing leaders in the future.




Thank you for this opportunity to re-energize and to learn so much. This would not have been possible without support from Maribeth's hard work and the support from Panhellenic, IFC, Vice President Jason Pina, and President Fred Clark. This hasn’t only prepared me for the next year and a half at BSU, but has also prepared me for the business world. I can’t wait to see all the changes that are to come. Every day is a great day to be a bear. 

The Leaders of Tomorrow

Just sitting back and reflecting on all that happened these past couple of days in Pittsburgh, I can say I feel inspired to make a positive difference not only in my chapter, but in the BSU community. Unfortunately, the outside world still views Greek Life as a realm to get hazed, sexually assaulted, drop out of college, etc. Yes, there are some fraternities/sororities that perform these types of behaviors on campuses across this country. However, they are not men/women, but children. They are the ones that consistently get publicized by the media for their barbaric acts towards the community they live in. Instead, the media should of publicizing the positives of joining Greek Life. They should of publicized this conference and hear ideas brothers and sisters were sharing with each other in order to improve the qualities of their significant chapters. 

NGLA was a conference filled with our future leaders, and I was damn proud to be one of the selected applicants who was able to represent the BSU community. I was able to network with brothers from my own chapter, Phi Kappa Theta, from Hofstra University in Long Island to St. Francis University in Philadelphia. Being able to connect with them and share the successes/failures of our very own chapters was just something I will never forget. Most importantly, being able to participate in sessions that will allow me to propel my chapter into the future was touching. Out of all the sessions I participated in, I would say Scholarship was the best one at the conference. Thanks to the speaker, as well as input from other brothers/sisters of other Greek organizations, I was able to listen to programs that either were a success at a chapter or a complete failure. For example, a plan I am currently working on with our VP of Intellectual (the person in charge of Scholarship for our chapter), is making different teams and creating a brotherhood type system that supports each other through academia. As the speaker said, at the end of the day, we are all brothers/sisters and are here to support one another. 

President Fred Clark, Vice President Jason Pina, thank you both for allowing me and other Greek members to participate in this year's NGLA conference. If it wasn't for this trip, I would not be able to advance my fraternity socially, intellectually, and connect it to the greater BSU community. It is important that we start looking at the good fraternities/sororities can bring to a campus as far as philanthropy and community service activities goes. We are the leaders of tomorrow. 

Sunday, February 28, 2016

NGLA Summary

After returning from NGLA and reviewing the experience as a whole I found it very informative and cannot wait to share what I have learned with my chapter and BSU Greek Life. I believe with the new tactics and tools I acquired from attending NGLA  I can help resolve some of the internal and external problems Greek Life and my chapter have.
Meeting multiple members of Pike from across the Northeast was also an incredible experience. As a newly chartered chapter of Pike it was interesting to discuss our journey with other Pikes.

Kyle Bueno snores

post NGLA sadness syndrome

As we sit in the JetBlue terminal I am reflecting on my time at NGLA as I sip my final Starbucks coffee [I miss dunks]. I do not want to get onto the plane in a little bit because that means that this amazing conference weekend is over and that breaks my little heart.
I had mixed feelings coming into the weekend between getting along with the delegation and how much I would like this conference compared to other ones I have attended but this entire experience has won my heart. When we got picked up at 5:45 in the morning on Thursday I had doubts that this weekend would not go well, but by Sunday I did not want to get off that bus when we pulled up to the clock tower arriving back at BSU. This conference has made me a stronger, more confident leader and showed me that although I will be graduating in a year from May, I can still make a huge impact within my chapter and Greek community.
            The only thing I wish I could change about this experience was not winning, more importantly not having any nominations for awards. Knowing that our Greek community and leaders do so much and hold so many good programs it was disappointing knowing that none of our members nominated us, but don’t you worry bears I got you for next year.
My biggest worry is that I will bring all of these new ideas to my chapter and they will not put any of them into consideration. I know that they will definitely incorporate different activities and lessons that I learned for sisterhood events, but the bigger idea involving scholarship programs may be harder to implement into our chapter.

I LOVE NGLA SO MUCH, IT’S BEEN SO REAL - #BlessUp

Professional Aspects of Greek Life

My most impactful session today was “Better Leader Today, Better Boss Tomorrow”. This session was lead by Lindsey Karp who referred to herself as a “real world Elle Woods” because she’s a professional sorority woman. I got some chuckles from the delegation for wanting to go so badly but for the record, that room was packed and there were 10+ people standing in the back. Lindsey spook about skills that are super essential to being a strong leader. As a leader, you are managing people. Here’s what you need to focus on:
1.      Prepare
a.       Actually research what the task your doing is supposed to be. Don’t just do it the same way and assume it is right. Don’t just start doing things unless you know what has been tried before and what has worked and failed. Stop assuming!
b.      Identity stakeholders or the people that are critical to the chapter’s success (alumnae, advisors, Greek Community)
c.       Plan for meetings
2.      Delegate
a.       Be transparent- share the bigger picture
b.      Efficiency, not time wasters
c.       Set clear expectations
d.      Don’t just dump things onto people. Delegation is good for tasks that you know how to do and can help with, but is suited better for someone else because of their position or growth opportunities
3.      Follow Up
a.       Does everyone actually understand what they are supposed to do?
b.      Did it actually get done? Don’t just do it yourself.
c.       Hold people accountable. If things don’t happen figure out why. How can you help prepare them to get the job done?
d.      Give and ask for feedback! It should be a two way street

Lindsey also gave some AWESOME words for use on your resume. You can really use your Greek experiences to your advantage and use it to highlight skills crucial in the business world. Don’t just write “served on GAC to plan Greek week”. Outsiders don’t know what you actually did. As far as they know, you could have held the position but not done anything with it to help gain experience. It’s all in the way you present yourself and articulate it through words.

Panhellenic or IFC Delegate
1.      Professionalism
2.      Effective Communication
3.      Trustworthy representative

Recruitment Coordinator
1.      Problem solving
2.      Training
3.      Teamwork

Social Chair
1.      Networking
2.      Positive relationship building
3.      Event planning

President
1.      Conflict management
2.      Project Management
3.      Risk Management

GAC
1.      Active Listening
2.      Effective communication
3.      Networking

General Member
1.      Accountability (through regular attendance of mandatory and non-mandatory events)
2.      Brand Management (you represent your organization. You are always wearing your letters)
3.      Teamwork



We all know what we do, but these words help us to articulate that to those who don't see our day to day operations!

Day 3... I love Greek Life, You Love Greek Life, We Love Greek Life, Greek Life Rocks

Wow, I can’t believe that NGLA is practically over! I have had such an amazing weekend and have learned so much. Today was another awesome day start to finish. I loved our opening session, called “Leadersh!t”. Our speaker Kristin was funny, honest, and real. She talked about her experiences as a leader during college, and the mistakes she made which caused others to not view her as a true leader. She gave us some really helpful advice and tips, including the three most important tools to use as a leader as well as “FBI” a communication tool. She told us the three most important tools as a leader were to have actionable values, accountability, and communication. Kristin acknowledged the fact that many of us have values and talk about what we should do and could do to represent them, but when it comes down to it we never truly put them into our behavior and actions. She suggested instead of just writing out goals or making statements such as “I want to live my values”; you need to make actionable statements. For example, instead of saying, “I want to live my values” you could be specific; “I want to promote our value of service and raise $200 dollars for our Relay event this semester”. This is still living out the values, but it puts a specific action into the statement and demonstrates how we can achieve the goal. Her second tip on accountability was straightforward and simple: you call me out on my shit, and I call you out on yours. I think this is a statement that all college students, especially Greek life members, can relate to. As members of such a tight knit community, with the strong bonds of brotherhood and sisterhood, we know each other, our potential, and standards, so we have the connection to be able to say “hey, you’re not representing yourself in a positive light drinking like this and advertising it” or things of that nature. I think it is important to have these honest conversations with our members and other Greek members because we need to hold ourselves to that higher standard that we preach about and need to act accordingly. Her third tip was on communicating with your members. She gave us an acronym to use as a template to formulate conversations with members. The acronym is “FBI: feeling, behavior, impact”. She said that by formulating your conversations this way we can better motivate, support, and communicate with our members and demonstrate the behavior of a good leader. I think this will be easy to utilize within our chapters and can help us become better communicators.

One session I attended today was “Extending the Possibilities: Does your Campus need a new NPC organization?”. I was super eager to attend this session and to see whether or not BSU would be in a good position to add to our Greek community. The session provided the reasons a campus should extend, including we need another representative organization, we need manageable chapter sizes for spatial reasons, the community could benefit from new life on campus, if the campus population is rapidly growing, and if the recruitment numbers (registered and placed) were rapidly growing. After determining if your campus was ready to extend, they explained the beginning process of extending, including have an extending committee walk around campus, collecting data, voting, forming an extending committee, etc. What I found especially important, besides extending for the right reasons was the role of Panhellenic in helping the new colony be successful. Panhel needs to be beside the organization from start to finish, ensuring that they receive the same support and opportunities on campus as the other organizations. Some ways Panhel can help support a new colony on campus includes letting them observe our recruitment on campus, share successful fundraising ideas, contact information of helpful staff, etc. I find this session super helpful because I hope that in the near future we can bring another sorority on campus, and with this information we can prepare our Panhellenic community to effectively bring more Greek life to campus.

We ended the night on a great note, getting all fancy and attending the Closing Banquet. We had some great food and got to witness the acknowledgement of the various accomplishments of other organizations and campuses. Events such as this, where we acknowledge all of the successes in our communities is one of the many things which makes me so proud to be Greek. I do hope that in the future the BSU Bears, including myself, will acknowledge the amazing accomplishments we have had on our campus and submit ourselves for more awards, because I truly believe we have one of the most amazing Greek communities and have excelled in many of the award categories. With that said, none of that would be possible without MB. Her support and passion for the Greek community and our success is so motivating, and it truly demonstrates what it means to be an amazing leader. As tonight comes to a close and we prepare to head home in the morning, I am already feeling nostalgic about leaving. It has been an amazing experience spending the weekend with so many other Greek members who have the same goals and desires for their chapters, and getting to work with them so closely this weekend, helping each other and working towards that common purpose of growth and success is another reason that makes me so proud to be in Greek life. As much fun as it has been, it has been a long, exhausting weekend, so I am off to bed! Goodnight Bears!

 

Saturday, February 27, 2016

Recruitment is a Relationship Business

       My last and final session at NGLA was definitely one to remember. @TinaRaeVan gave her presentation on Dynamic Recruitment and gave super helpful tips that all of our organizations at BSU can use! I refer to her as @TinaRaeVan because that is her Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter and she wants everyone to follow us, she also gave us her personal phone number and had us text her.

    She talked about how recruitment is all about human interaction; she said that people join people. The three most important things about recruitment are first impression, what we talk about, and how we talk about it. We first talked about the five most important things about first impressions. In order to make a good first impression you need to have a good handshake, eye contact, smile, body language, and attitude. After learning first impression we discussed that during recruitment it is important to talk about what they want to talk about.

   We then got into the Five F-Words to use in recruitment. The Five F-Words are family, fun, favorites, future, and from. If you use these topics to start conversations than the conversation will seem less structured and more meaningful than regular recruitment conversations. Another important aspect to asking questions at recruitment is just simply 'asking good questions'. Tina believes that open-ended questions are the best type of questions you can ask. If you start off with an open ended question, there will be good connection points and it will help bring the conversation more to life. Below I attached some open-ended phrases that can be good conversation starters.

I LOVE TINA and RECRUITMENT TIPS!!

Day 3: Leadersh!t

After missing breakfast by one minute yesterday, I decided the obvious solution today was to skip breakfast all together and sleep in. It was a good decision. Our keynote speaker of the day was Kristen Hadeed who entitled her program "Leadersh!t". Kristen spoke of her past experiences as a leader of her self-made cleaning company, and how over the past seven years she has had to grow as a person and as a leader. She told stories of how she would clock out of work and go out with her employees and make irresponsible decisions. She told of one specific occasion when she had two of her high school aged employees bartend a party she hosted. Halfway through she decided it was not fair to those two employees that they were not having a good time. She proceeded to pour three shots and give them to her underage employees. She then spent the next twenty minutes helping them throw up in the bathroom. She told many other stories with similar outcomes. One day she realized that if she wanted to succeed she needed to make some changes in her life. She introduced me to a exercise she calls FBI. This is a way to better communicate with the people around you. FBI stands for Feeling, Behavior, and Impact. An example of an FBI could be: I feel disappointed because you committed to coming to the meeting last week and now you are telling me you cannot and the impact that has is I am unsure if i can rely on you in the future. This example effectively communicates to the person on the other side why Kristen was upset and what the impact of their action has on their relationship. This an effective tool I would love to bring back to my chapter. I think in any leadership role it is important to be an effective communicator if you want to get anything done.

My first session of the day was entitled "Putting the Act back in ACTion"presented by Stephanie Wright. Stephanie talked about why people "run" from our chapters. She gave four main reasons that members may decide to leave our chapters, even if the previous semester they may have been the overly excited members. These reasons were family issues, lack of understanding, joined for the wrong reasons, and the intake process. Stephanie gave ways that given each of these reasons you can try to regain the members attention.

For the first reason, family issues, you as a member can make sure that sisterhood (or brotherhood) prevails. You should try to have deeper conversations with your sisters and try to understand what they are going through. It may be hard to remember as someone who is not going through specific situations, but other people may have priorities that are more important to them than your organization is at this point in their life. If the issues is more serious than you can handle with a deeper conversation, you need to also be aware of what other resources you can direct your member towards that can positively help them. It may be hard but you do not have the tools to help everyone with serious

For the second reason, lack of understanding, you as a leader need to realize that sometimes people join your organization under false pretenses. They do not fully understand what your organization stands for and what you work towards everyday. As a leader you need to ask these members what they think their role in the chapter is and also remind them what their actual role is. Often if a member is trying to leave your organization they do not see themselves as vital part of your chapter, which in reality is the farthest thing from the truth. If you support your members and encourage them to take leadership positions they have a reason to want to stay and make a difference.

Another reason that people might want to leave is joining for the wrong reasons. Sometimes people join organizations for all the wrong reasons. They see the shirts, they see the people, and think that joining an organization means an improved social life. Sometimes you need to give these members a reality check and remind them what your organization stands for and the values that you hold your chapter to. If you can find a persons interest you may be able to retain them as a member, and give them a reason to want to stay.

Lastly, the intake process is important to the retention of members. If you recruit members on certain principles but the second that these new members join the chapter you change what you stand for, they will not feel as close to the chapter. They joined this chapter from what they saw during recruitment and the people that they thought they knew. As a leader you need to make sure that you keep in mind your organizations image and reputation, the leadership development you provide for your chapter, and the kind of campus involvement that you promote to your chapter. All of these things will make members want to stay in your organization and strive to make a change.


Day 2, Wow

Day number 2 at NGLA! So today was honestly overwhelming because of all of the information that I attained from the sessions I went to. The day started with off with the keynote speaker Dr. Richard Decapua the Associate Dean of Students and Adjunct Faculty at Boston College. His presentation was titled Dynamic Influence and had to do a lot with the history of Greek life in the United States and how it is our actions that define who we are. The largest point that he made was that we as Greek's tend to have a Rhetoric and a Reality and in the past they have not been reflective of each other. His challenge to us was that we must make our reality be our rhetoric, or otherwise we are hypocrites.

Although the sessions that I attended today were informational, the must influential one was the Creating an Effective and Meaningful Judicial process for your IFC. Daniel Greenebaum is the Coordinator of IFC Services for the North- American Interfraternity Conference, and he presented on how your IFC judicial board can better understand their purpose, appropriate sanctions, and how to be an effective entity. Daniel was able to break down the process of starting a judicial case into, Has policy been broken, writing a letter of summary of the given complaint that was presented to the board, and the investigation process of the case against a group/individuals, holding an Informal Hearing, follow up, and then Call a formal Hearing, Giving sanctions, and Creating a Final Statement. The best thing that Daniel discussed was when conduction all of the different sections of the judicial process, reaching out to professionals on your campus that do those types of things every day. (Ex: reaching out to the Conduct Office to see what type of sanctions that are given to the students ans how they are worded.)

At the end of today we went out for dinner and then came back to the hotel and got to go dancing. This was such an awesome experience for me. Getting to meet people from different Multicultural Greek organizations and getting to see their different "calls" and "strolls/walks" was eye opening.Their "calls" are different ways of identifying if there is a member of your organization near by you. The "strolls/walks" are different dances that are used to show off who your organization is and how good you are at dancing. What was interesting to see is how people from different councils are not allowed to make their own strolls or calls because it is seen as disrespecting the MCG organizations.

Here is hoping that Day three is as good as day one.

You don't have to be the loudest person in the room to make a difference

Day 3 was great, I had a lot of inspiring and motivating speakers. The one that stood out the most to me was Jessica Abo's talk on "Affluence is not a requirement for Influence". Jessica Abo was the kind of woman I aspire to be. She has done so much in her lifetime to give back to organizations and people. Jessica gave us 3 terms and asked us to define them; recruitment, community, and apathy. Recruitment means education, education the potential new members on our organizations, our values, and our philanthropies, and why we do these things. Community means communication, how am I talking to my organization. I need to figure out the most effective form of communication amongst the members in my organization, if they are an emailing person, don't call them. The third point was apathy which means appreciation. Appreciate every person that walks through your organizations door, from alumni to new member.



When Jessica was in high school she heard about the Thompson Family, which was the first African America family to have sextuplets. Around the same time this family had sextuplets, so didn't a white family who was receiving a lot of recognition from the news and the locals. Jessica thought this was unfair and the Thompson's deserved to be recognized. The Thompson's were a very low class family, and deserved the world, and that is exactly what Jessica wanted to give them. Jessica began contacting news stations and newspapers to get any information on how to contact this family. Jessica was turned down so many times because she was a 16 year old who wanted to help better. I bet if Jessica was caught stealing, this story would be headline news. Helping people should not be this hard, nor should it be hard to receive recognition. Jessica rally-ed her school, and they found the Thompson family and they reached out with a wishlist. Jessica and those behind her got every single item on that list and got everyone to travel on a bus and hand deliver these items.

FOX and CNN covered the story and within a week, Freddie Mac gave the Thompson family a new home; a car company gave them a van; and Howard University gave free college tuition to all five of the surviving children. Soon after, Jessica attended the Thompson sextuplet's first birthday at Howard University, and a tad bit later, they all came to Bethlehem, PA for Jessica's high school graduation. Till this day Jessica is really close with the Thompson and continues to be involved in their life.



"I think teaching young people that affluence is not a requirement for influence is a great lesson because you don't need to be a certain age to make a difference," said Abo. "You just need to see a place where you can step in and step up"
 http://www.fox5dc.com/news/2260367-story#

I think we all can learn from this beautiful story. Philanthropy is and should be personal. We join our organizations to make not only an impact but a lasting one. We need to leave a legacy of amazing community services efforts and give back to our community, which we reside in. Go out and find an organization or a cause, whether it be a homeless shelter, salvation army, or even a local restaurant. Think about who is an influencer in your community, reach out to them, and have them be apart of your efforts. Do NOT get caught up in group think. Jessica was not the most outgoing and she taught us that you don't have to be the loudest person in the room to make a difference.

I encourage you all to look her up and reach out, she is amazing!
@JessicaAboTV
http://www.talkinggood.com/profiles/JessicaAbo

PARK YOUR CAR ON EXCELLENT ST.

WOW. It is really the last day. Waking up was extra hard today but that’s ok because the first key note speaker was amazing. Her name was Kristen Hadeed and she became CEO of a company at 21 GASP. She spoke about many topics including professionalism and how to be a leader. She also spoke about how important it is to have values but that setting actions with these values so that everyone is on the same page and can be held accountable.  

My first session started off with a huge topic that isn’t talked about much unless your major field is involved in it ….. PRIVILEGE. What are your privileges? How can you use yours to help others ? Not many people know what privilege is which is sad because it determines everything and every aspect of your life daily. Privileges is related to race, class, gender identity, citizenship status, sexual orientation, education and many more but my hands are starting to hurt …So if you’d like to know please come talk YALL KNOW I LIKE TALKING… and this is my favorite topic so please don’t hesitate to ask ! 

Tish Norman was another session I went to that I enjoyed very much. Her energy was out of this world and she interacted with the audience more than I had seen it a while. She asked 4 main questions that can help higher our expectation of each others as Greek members: Who are we? What do we want? What is our purpose? What are we grateful for? THINK ON THESE THINGS and it will help with improving your Greek experience and your organization.  

My last session focused on Divine 9 Organizations (Historically black fraternities and sororities ) . In this session the speaker focused on removing barriers and explained that it’s important to provide each other with resources and support regardless of our council.  (THERE ARE 4 COUNCILS BTW : IFC, NPC, NPHC AND MGCs) It was very discussion based so I don’t have much notes but yall get the point, Im sure  

I have learned so much this week that I cannot wait to bring back to school so YALL WILL BE HEARING MY VOICE .
I FORGOT SOMETHING !!!! I got to sit and meet other ASTs for lunch and it was really interesting to see how there chapters run, sizes and other craziness !!! 

Hope you enjoyed reading !!!! 

I keep getting free stuff, trip was worth it

Today involved multiple sessions that I believe provided something beneficial to bring back to BSU Greek Life. For example one seminar discussed the perception of Greek Life from outside sources and how to tackle those issues. Another seminar was on membership retention which is an issue that can always be decreased.
The focal point of my day was the affiliation lunch where I meant other Pikes from the Northeast. Apparently one member gives away free shirts at every NGLA attends so I got more free stuff today which is pretty hype.

The light bulbs in the hotel room are definitely energy saving because they are wicked dim.

Keynote: one person can ruin everything we built in one second

     We started off today by attending Kristen Hadeed's keynote talk "Leadersh!t" and yes that is how she spelled it - which was a brutally honest and hilarious program about leadership. Kristen was a twenty one year old CEO who struggled with leadership power which almost ruined her business. She spoke upon three values that we as a Greek community must live up to.
 
    The first value is "actionable values". This value is all about members that say they live and uphold their organizations values but do the opposite. What I took out of this value was that we need to realize that people notice what you do. She quoted that "a whisper is a shout" which is very true, especially in such a small tight-knit community like we have a Bridgewater. Every small action you do as a member reflects your organization. The second value she spoke upon was accountability. Kristen is a firm believer that within a sisterhood or a brotherhood, or even just with a close friend you should hold each other accountable for your actions. Another aspect of holding each other accountable is to make sure that if you are holding one brother, sister, or friend accountable than you must treat your other members in the same manner.

  She told us a story of how a friend of hers got too intoxicated while wearing letters and did something that was highly uncharacteristic of her and the values of her organization. This is where I get the quote "one person can ruin everything we built in one second" - because of her friend's actions, that organization has struggles with image and recruiting sisters TILL THIS DAY and this situation occurred in 2009.

The last value she spoke upon was "conversations that make a difference". This value showed that you should always have someone in your life or organization that brings out the best in its people. She then introduced the 'FBI' - feeling, behavior, impact lesson that I believe all BSU Greeks should do. The FBI challenge was to text someone telling them how you truly feel - either positive or negative. The following are examples that Kristen gave us:

Negative FBI: I feel disappointed, because you committed to tomorrow's event and now you are telling me you cannot go and the impact that has is I am now unsure if I can rely on you in the future.

Positive FBI: I feel proud when you shared your opinion at chapter today and the impact that has is that it inspires me to be a better member.


I challenge all of you to live up to Kristen's values and to text a friend an FBI statement.

Day 2: Amelia was Hangry

Day two of NGLA started with me waking up at 8:11am. Everyone left the hotel to get breakfast at 8:10am. This is my life. I guess in hindsight it was nice to take my time waking up, but my stomach hated me all morning since I did not get the chance to eat until our lunch session at 12:15pm. To be honest the lunch line was way too long and the food was not ideal which led to a very hangry Amelia.

The first session of the day was entitled, "The Apathy Myth"and was presented by a speaker by the name of T.J. Sullivan. If you read my blog yesterday you know that I have an unhealthy obsession with T.J. Just last week I came home from a Leadership Conference that was directed toward my sorority, Phi Sigma Sigma, and T.J. lead a session called "Motivating the Middle". Coming into this session I had high hopes since my experience last weekend was so amazing. To start off the session, T.J. spoke about a close friend of his that used to work for an advertising agency. His agency was specifically aimed at advertising to young adults aged 18-25. T.J. explained that there are five things that agencies use to get a young adult to buy their product. Any combination of the five is proven to be successful. These five things are: money, food, fun, sex, and alcohol. Adding just five more things that T.J. came up with including: competition, friends, cool experiences, guilt/duty, and a penalty, he says that you can help advertise your chapter to your members just as an agency advertises products to the general public. If you used the ten items stated above and applied them to an specific events, you can see why some events tend to be more exciting than others. For example, if  you were to talk about a spring break trip to Cancun you could apply, money (free giveaways), food (free food), fun, sex (limited clothing), alcohol, competition (games), friends, and cool experiences. Whereas if you talked about a chapter meeting you could apply, a feeling of guilt/duty, or penalties for not attending. No wonder we cannot motivate members to want to sit through a meeting every week. When we use the positive points to motivate our members, we see a more positive result.

T.J. also told a story about a chapter that he advises for and their community service chair. The community service chair was upset because he could not get brothers actively engaged in the volunteer work at the boys and girls club. T.J. gave him the advice to celebrate those who show up and stop stressing about those who don't. Successfully getting a few members to be actively involved in an event is more important than making the event mandatory and having disengaged members attend and not make a positive impact. Once you celebrate those members who show up, you can have them share their stories of the amazing things they got out of their service opportunities, in turn motivating their peers to get involved too.

One of the most influential things that T.J. taught me in this session was how to lead my chapter. He explained that leaders stress attendance too much. Attendance cannot be seen as validation for a leader. Just because you successfully got your whole chapter to show up to an event does not mean that the whole chapter is engaged and positively contributing. He also explained that as a leader in an organization, you are not running the NASA space station, and it should not be a complicated process, Treat your members with respect and make them feel included. If they walk into chapter and the executive board is sitting up front stern faced, members get the feeling that this is the executive boards meeting and that they just need to show up and listen to what they have to say. That should never be the case. Don't drive your members away, and maybe they will recommit and involve themselves.

Although I attended two other sessions today, neither compared to the hour I had with T.J. Sullivan. To end an amazing first day of sessions, the BSU delegation went out to dinner and I witnessed two friends inhale a rather large cheeseburger in under five minutes flat (slightly impressed, slightly grossed out). We then walked to the store to purchase snacks for our pajama party. On the way there we may have took too many videos of us all running around giving piggy back rides and dancing down the street. The one thing I have learned so far is that there is never a dull moment when you're exploring the city with friends. To finish out the night the whole delegation (besides Nick who fell asleep) crammed into one hotel room and ate snacks and played Heads Up. Did we receive a noise complaint from a security officer? Yes. Was it worth it to see MB fall on the floor laughing at Kyle? Yes it was.

NGLA day three I am so ready for you!


Laugh..... @ yourself

Day TWO:
“Each one of us has a fire in our hearts. It’s our goal in life to find it and keep it lit”
-Mary Lou Retton 

It seems like NGLA justs keeps getting better by day ….. 
Our first session began with a conversation on Networking. The speaker pointed out that many of us do it wrong . Now if you know me , you’d know that I do not like being wrong . Anyways, she explained that networking isn’t only about selling yourself but its about building relaionships with the people you are networking with. That way, they can REMEMBER you through the conversation and hopefully build an even better relationship in the future. DROPS MIC.

My next session was about Personal Power and Being a Bystander 
This was not the average “bystander conversation” but the speaker added new ways to diffuse situations regardless of the setting.  

Next session of the day focused on women empowerment YASSSSS LADIES!
She spoke about being present as a women in a mans world. MAKE THE MEN UNCOMFORTABLE WITH YOUR COFIDENCE. Be present. Keep talking. Keep raising your hand. Be a champ for the women who do not yet have your courage. Many times we think about wanting to “Change the world” and that’s great but lets keep it real, you prob won’t. HOWEVER. Create an 18 month plan about what you want to change, then a life long plan about things you want to change and one day you’ll change others and EVETUALLY those who will continue your work will CHANGE THE WORLD. 
So my question for you is : What would you do if you weren’t afraid ? 
I’m sure you got plenty of ideas SO GET UP. AND BE ABOUT THE ACTION. 

The last session I attended was about being AUTHENTIC in life and in Greek life. 
I am most definitely not a quote person but this guy was spitting straight FIRE and because I love you all, I will share what he said!
“A diploma don’t make you a good person”
“Do you values/priorities align with your lifestyle?”
“Billions on people would kill to have your worst day”
“Want to find peace? SLOW DOWN” 
Don't worry, I will break this all down for you. 

First, having a great GPA/getting a diploma/making it to college/excelling in college DOES NOT automatically give you the great person ticket. You have to put in some work ; i know work work work work works sucks but trust me it will be worth it ! (PS : I am working on this too so I aint an expert, I'm just saying what he said in TEE language). 

Second, whether it be your organizations values or your own personal values, it is important that they align with your lifestyle (TRUST ME I AM WORKING ON THIS TOO).  This applies to priorities as well . Here's an example : If your family is number one priority in your life yet you never go home on the weekend to see them because *insert color & house* is throwing down, is your family really a priority ?! Here's a tip : go visit the fam, say hello, and then go to where ever your heart desires. BOOM. 

Third, someone in the world would kill to have your worst day. WHY ?! Because YOUR WORST DAY IS NOT THAT BAD. SO WHAT YOU FAILED THE TEST. THE WORLD GOES ON . Theres people in the world who's water is brown and the state declares it "safe" (FLINT MI), theres girls who can't go to school, theres people STARVING, there are people who are getting killed just because of there appearance , theres people who ACTUALLY have REALLY BAD DAYS , EVERYDAY.  Everything will fall into place once this part of your life is settled. Now, idk how that is because he was talking to fast and I missed that part ....BUT I HAVE FAITH IN YOU ALL TO FIGURE IT OUT. 

PS: This NGLA squad is fire. We found the secret elevator that never has a line . YAS. 
My shirt was 48640809248509134 sizes too small but it was cute so i wore it... the sad part is that it would come off when it was supposed to so I had some extra help with removing this disaster (THANK AMELIA) #sisterhood #goals



One Love,
-Tee  

Day 2: How many Bears fit in an elevator?

Well, we have learned it's about a dozen.


NGLA, Day 2. Well, I woke up before my alarm, so that was great. The day started at 7am wake up and now everything is officially over for the night. Today was  the first day of sessions, and all of mine were fantastic and I know they will all be super helpful to my chapter.

My first two were for local organizations. The first was more group discussions. I really didn't think I would like the fact that it was like that, but it was really wonderful. My specific group was more focused on how to fix internal problems we have, and how to rush better. A lot of people gave me really good ideas to bring back to BSU. Several people said they used a points system, and when people didn't show up at event or did something bad, they lost points. Doing something positive, or something above and beyond what is asked will get you extra points. Other things they said helped their members bond were "sister dates". However often they did them, one person would pick a name from a jar and whatever sister they pulled is the one they would go and spend time with. In Phi Pi Delta, one of our big problems with alumni is that they never want us to change, and someone put it very nicely by saying that we need to remind them that "Change = growth, and growth = knowing we won't die off". Someone also suggested to get people to see that even though we are small, we're still like all the other organizations, we should have and be included in some type of all Greek mixer.

 And I had a friend! Briana is from upstate NY, and is on the EBoard of her sorority. She and I went to our other two sessions together, which was nice because they both made us talk to people near us. The second session of the day that we went to was about how locals can better fun themselves since we don't always 100% fall under a governing body like IFC or Panhel.  It seemed like basic things, but it was good to have someone actually say them and make you realize, this should be done, it sounds easy so we should be able to do it. Some of the things that I head I want to immediately start to accomplish, and others I know I will have to discuss in chapter for probably at least another semester. Some simple things I realized Phi Pi Delta doesn't have are: up to date risk management, emergency protocol, handbooks for officers, and insurance. These are all things I think we can accomplish by the end of 2016. We also do not have a 'brand', and though brands are not why people joined (as talked about in my next session), they are still important so people have something visually consistent with us. "If you don't put your message out there, others will do it for you". Lastly, this session has me thinking about pros and cons for if BSU had an IGC (InterGreek Council).

The last session was about recruitment. This is something we don't do well with. I went into this thinking they'll have some big, magical answer. And they did and did not. Three point to successful recruitment: 1. you must KNOW PNMs to get them too join, 2. People join people, not letters, 3. Letters scare people, be a little normal for non-Greeks. Also, it can't just be one week or weekend. You can't just do it once or twice a year and expect people to know actives, to like them, to know about the organization, getting PNMs is a 365 day job. But that's easy, because recruitment is a hello and a handshake, making a friend, talking us up once. It's connecting to people and making those personal connections with them. "Don't make recruitment you life, make your life recruitment."

That was all for the sessions. After those we got family dinner up the street. The conference was having some night entertainment (DJ and hypnotist), so we went and checked those out until 10pm. THEN IT WAS PAJAMA JAM! We had snack and played games, and talked and hung out with MB. So it was clearly the best Friday night ever.


Day 2: SUCCESS

Common Theme of Sessions: Celebrate Those who Care.


             Today started off with a keynote speaker who left a lasting impact on me. President Dr. Kimbrough spoke upon many different topics, including hazing. In his presentation he showed images from different articles with images speaking about different hazing incidents. This opened my eyes to how many hazing situations there are world wide. Although we are lucky enough to have such an anti-hazing community, I believe that our Greek community should be more informed on what is going on in the world.

         The first session I attended today was, The Apathy Myth, presented by T.J. Sullivan. This session was focused on the fact that 'people will always find time for things that they care about'. He lead the conversation with the Big 5 that marketing agencies use to attract students [money, food, fun, sex, and alcohol] and then talked about five other topics that can attract students [competition, friends, cool experiences - with two "negative attractions" guilt or duty, and penalty]. He then used this to compare a trip to a chapter meeting. He made us realize that the only attraction to chapter was friends and the two negative attractions. This made me realize that maybe our chapters at BSU could start changing the format of how they run meetings.
           - For example: Instead of having weekly chapter meetings, have biweekly chapters and on the off weeks do bonding activities or service events. Instead of giving reports at chapters, you could have the chairs send the secretary their reports and have him or her email / print and hand out to the members. In the time that is now saved - the chapter can grow and strengthen their connections by talking about current events, or even just personal issues going on in their life.
        Another point that he touched upon was events and his opinion on whether or not "mandatory" events should be a thing. In the presenter's opinion he believes that all mandatory events are burning out members and should not be enforced by chapters. He believes, AND I AGREE, that we should be celebrating those who show up to events and put in effort. Although it may be disappointing to see how many sisters/ brothers show up to an event it is important to remember that attendance DOES NOT equal success, but what is gained and learned by the members that attend get is what matters. One last point that he made on this topic was how mandatory events are lazy. He stated that "in life you will never be able to mandate". With this idea, he stated that in this case it would be smarter for chapters to have multiple smaller events compared to one larger event because that way you could pertain to more members. It is not possible to always please ninety percent of a chapter by forcing them to go to a large mandatory event, but if you have smaller events you can find what different interests members have and have a stronger attendance of members who actually want to be there.
        This session also focused on how each chapter has thirds - the top third who is the rocket fuel of the chapter, the middle third, and the bottom third of the chapter whose members are disengaged. We need to focus on the middle third members. T.J. Sullivan referred to this selection of members as the "good enough" members. He recommended making the middle third a selection of events they need to go to. To the people who make the list of events - they will be disappointed, but if they allow their members to live the "good enough" mentality. once they have time and effort they will come back and hopefully try harder to be more active within the chapter.


      The second session I attended was called Happy Hour 24/7 presented by Matt Glowacki. I first met Matt at the NACA conference I attended last semester. Matt is extremely motivational - he was born with no legs, but is the happiest man I have ever met. The biggest lesson I learned from this session is to always remember what makes you happy. In sad moments of time, this can be the one thing that cheers you up. Matt also gave a cute quote that "being uncertain increases pleasure". This is an important quote to bring back to your chapter, especially when discussing new ideas that cause questions and concerns. When going into an event with an open mind and not having high expectations, you will learn and be willing to try more. He also gave us chocolate and bubbles :)
He also gave us a bag of "defective" jelly beans with a note. The note explained that these jelly beans were discarded from Jelly Belly because of the way they looked. Matt told us that he gave us these jelly beans because they represented how we should view people - not by what is on the outside, but what is on the inside.

     The last and final session I went to today was titled "Moving Scholarship Programs - Boring to Beneficial" hosted by Tim Mousseau. This session was about the current truths about scholarship programs on the chapter, council, and community level  and how + I QUOTE THIS "they all suck". This session was more direct and upfront than the other two sessions I attended today, but it was also the most real. One thing that stood out to me was how much Tim felt that GPA should not be what we focus our scholarship programs around. One reason for this is because "people who always do well will always get rewarded and the people who do poorly will always get punished."
      Tim spoke about how we need to make scholarship programs about individualized goals. We, as chapters, need to remember that everyone has a cause of why their GPA is what it is at. To support his claim on why study hours suck, Tim talked about how everyone has different learning styles and forcing members to study together cause conflicts due to these styles. To learn about our own learning styles he recommended that we as Greek leaders should sponsor quizzes (either free through school resources or pay a small fee) to find out how we can make a system that works best for our members and organizations.

He gave us ten ideas to improve Scholarship Programs, here you go:
1. Individualized study plans
2. Scholarship based mentor programs (star sisters, major moms)
    - He also mentioned that we could utilize big little relationships for this
3. Accountability for all - no matter what program you choose, make all members do it.
4. Professor office hours!
    - Each organization should suggest that members go to office hours (IN LETTERS) to make connections between academics and Greek Life and to show that we are passionate about our academics.
5. Recognition and scholarship. - reward people who work the hardest (not always GPA based)
6. Use learning styles*
7. Remove limiting practices - study hours, study sessions
8. Scholarship based recruitment
9 + 10. Use/ become campus tutors and use campus resources.

Overall, the sessions that I attended today were super informative and I enjoyed all of them. I believe that I have a great ideas that I will bring back to BSU and specifically my chapter. I cannot wait to see what tomorrow brings!

Diversity is a Beautiful Thing

Day 2 of NGLA has unfortunately come to an end. At first, I did not know what to expect; I thought it was going to be the same conference like the one I went on for SGA (which, by the way, was not fun at all. Sorry Kaitlyn ;) ). But, just on the second day, I have already learned so much and am excited to bring this knowledge back to my fraternal organization, Phi Kappa Theta. For example, two of the sessions I went to were about how to recruit quality over quantity brothers/sisters and scholarship programs. To be completely honest, Phi Kappa Theta would greatly benefit from these tips on how to prepare our own members to ask the real questions to our potential new members and setup a new system so brothers who are falling behind scholastically will be able to reach a hand up and not constantly be criticized.

However, what really was the icing on the cake was seeing different multi-cultured fraternities/sororities at a dance tonight. Unfortunately, as far as Greek organizations, one of the things we can definitely improve on is making minorities and other races feel more included in Greek Life. In my opinion, I feel as if a majority of students at BSU still hold a stigma that being Greek is bad and not good. However, if we accepted multi-cultured groups to be charted on campus, then I feel as if that stigma would change completely. But, what amazed me about this was the way they were dancing and made it into a ritual. When Jake Bolarinho was speaking to one of the members from the multi-cultured organization, he spoke about the whole dancing ritual of the organizations and said if an outsider tried to dance with them it would be considered disrespectful due to the fact they see it as their ritual. As a Latino man (well half since I also am Portuguese) I really felt this sense of connection as they were playing the music I enjoy dancing to which is Spanish/Brazilian. It was just really interesting to finally see something we do not ever see on campus and to see the differences we have with multi-cultured organizations. I definitely would love to do something to include them in our Greek community.

Here is a little clip of what I am talking about:

Friday, February 26, 2016

Keep an open mind

Hello Blog, we meet again, except this time it is 10:21pm. Day 2 here at NGLA was amazing, I got to listen in on different sessions such as "Can We Talk", "Leading at the Edge", and "Greek Life to Real Life". "Can We Talk" was the session that resonated with me the most.

"Can We Talk" presented by  Kimberly Mack from Campus Speak, was about those crucial conversations and how to approach them and be better at them. There are three different approaches to dealing with crucial conversations 1) Deal with it well, 2) Face it head on and fail, and 3) Avoid it. "Can We Talk" also provided 7 tips on these crucial conversations.

1) Start with yourself...what is at stake?
2) Be aware. Is the conversation defensive or dialogue? (emotional climax of conversation)
3) Safety is key. Create a comfortable situation by apologizing/asking questions.
4) Own your story. Focus on what happened and what made you feel a certain way.
5) State your intent. Share your facts and conclusions so that the other party can see where you are coming from.
6) Explore the other persons intent. Find out what the other person is thinking. Make sure you understand.
7) Move ahead. Come to a consensus about what will happen. Document who will do what, by who, and settle on a way to follow up

When preparing for these tough conversations use your strengths, if you are good at problem solving, use it. Make sure when you have these conversations, that you have a GOAL. A lot of the time when we have these conversations, but we do not have a goal, we just bicker back and fourth and come up with a punishment. Swallow your pride and return to your goal. Take a time out and breathe. Make something positive come out of this conversation.

If the tips do not work try following the CRIB method.

Commit to seek mutual purpose
Recognizing the purpose  behind the strategy
Invent a mutual purpose
Brainstorm new ideas

Talk to your chapter or Eboard and let them know both the negatives and the positives. At the end of the day no one wants to have this crucial conversations but they need to happen. After this session I feel a little bit better and more confident going into these difficult conversations. Be open, hear your sister/brother out, everyone makes mistakes, it is your job to make sure that same mistake does not happen.

On a lighter note...



Today was a lot of fun and I learned about so many different things. One of the best parts of today was bonding with our NGLA delegation. Today I woke up and made my way to Starbucks, Starbucks is the key to a great start to your day. At lunch we had some different food I guess you could say. There was spinach with honey mustard sauce, raspberry sauce. For toppings there were roasted hazelnuts, berries, cheese and more.There was also turkey wraps and chicken wraps, and small desserts. Today we all discovered the hidden service elevator which was extremely sketchy but it was funny because we managed to skip the long elevator ride. I got to bond with everyone in ways I never have before, To wrap up the night we explored the dance party where we witnessed Culturally based sororities and fraternities, and there scrolling (dances), it was amazing to watch. To end the night we are having a pajammy jamm party, and it is a lot of fun!




Goodnight everyone!


Connections, Perception, and Resilience

3 pages of notes and 6 handouts later, day 2 has come to a close. I started off the morning by attending “Yes, Chapter Advisors are Actually Helpful” with Jesse Koch presenting. There were 4 of us in the audience- a graduate assistant Greek advisor, a chapter advisor, an undergrad who colonized in Fall 2014, and myself. It was cool because Jesse Koch was able to interact with us on a more personal level and we were able to engage with him and the varying advisors in the room. (I was also able to discuss being a chartering class member and some of the struggles that come with that with the other undergrad in the room.) There was a lot of discussion of two types of advisors, the MIA advisor and the advisor that is reliving college through the chapter. Setting expectations and ensuring advisors are up to date with each other and with chapter business is crucial in insuring that you and your advisors are working as a team to aid in your chapter’s success. Another helpful hint is to appreciate them. They volunteer in their positions so show a little gratitude during Advisor Appreciation Month (April) and through strengthening your personal connections with them. Learn their birthday. Learn their significant other’s birthday. Ask about their family so that when their kid wins the little league championship you can be excited for them and build a personal relationship.

The next session I attended was “Perception is Reality”. This session discussed how social media provides you with an opportunity to create your own individual brand. To outsiders who don’t know you, whatever perception they have of you IS their reality of who you are and the values that you represent. This is important for our own personal account and to organizational accounts. It is crucial to keep it clean and professional and present ourselves in a way that will receive respect. We also discussed what to do when people post bad things on social media. Many discussed strategies to get the picture down from posting a secret message to giving warnings to sending to standards board. It was argued that if you just ask someone to take it down or give them a warning, they won’t have the crucial conversation that will help them learn why the post isn’t ok. Those conversations are important to help push your brothers or sisters to become the best versions of themselves, not to chastise them.

My final session was “Resilient Leadership”. In this session we discussed the foundation of unstoppable leadership. You need to identify your passions, ensure you have the right mindset, find your support team, and build up faith in yourself. There is value in failure as long as you view it as an opportunity to learn. Your challenges are there to make you grow; you just have to respond the right way. Turn thoughts into words, words into actions, actions into habits, and habits transform character and be an unstoppable leader. “Once you can master hardships, a happy life will be found.”


Tee and I with ASTs from NYIT

I’m so excited for tomorrow’s session and to learn even more from fellow Greeks and  from the presenters! For the time being, I'm off to the Jammy Jam. 

Day 2: Awesome Bagels, Even Better Sessions

I LOVE NGLA! I can't believe day two is already done, it flew by and filled my brain with so many ideas to bring back to BSU. First off, I had my very first Brugger's Bagels experience, and I am officially obsessed... cinnamon sugar bagel and maple cream cheese = delicious = heaven=AKA my morning was awesome... seriously were talking better than Bridgewater Bagel good. Today's sessions completely exceeded my expectations completely, and made me so eager to come back to campus and share with everyone. My first session was "Redefining Sisterhood", which was amazing and so informative. After completing the questionnaire on what I agree/disagree with about the meaning of sisterhood, we discussed the five different types of sisterhood that can exist on a campus and within every chapter, and how we need to balance them. The types of sisterhood present can help us retain our members better as well as help them feel more valuable in our organizations, which can help us improve our overall sisterhood experience as sorority women. I am looking forward to having this session come to campus so we can specify our results to each individual chapter and gain insights about all four organizations on campus. My second session was "A Bigger Pie: How to collaborate and not compete in our Greek Community". First things first, my session speaker had the best dancing skills, check my snap story for a sneak peek. Secondly, he made me hug a stranger, which is not my favorite thing to do..... but the stranger was into it so it happened... it was awkward. Nonetheless, this session really made me proud of our Greek community because I felt that after having listened to the session, that our Greek community was way more collaborative than most of the other's who were in the room with me. I am so glad to be able to reflect on our community and see that we do work together, co-sponsor events, and support one another, and this session helped me acknowledge that even further. My takeaway from that session was that the more we collaborate, the more other non-affiliated students on campus will see that we are one community and that this will attract even more students to join Greek life. My last session was "Circle of Sisterhood" and it was spectacular! I got to meet and take a picture with Ginny.. she rocks... were BFFs now. During the session we talked about the origins of this philanthropy and ways we can raise awareness and launch it on our campus. We also discussed how even though this is a Panhellenic philanthropy, we need to include men in our efforts of raising awareness, ending women's oppression, and providing girls with the same educational opportunities. I am super excited because after talking with Ginny I have come up with some great events to hold during next years Circle of Sisterhood week. I am hoping that these sorts of events will help us make CofS flourish on our campus and become a philanthropy that both fraternity and sorority members will continuously support. The amazing experience I had today keeps me excited for my upcoming sessions, and I look forward to starting all over again tomorrow, with another fantastic bagel from Bruggers. Now I am off to the annual Bears Pajama Jammy Jam, WOO!