11/30/07
Greek unity and community involvement will be the driving force behind newly elected executive officers’ actions for governing bodies like Interfraternity Council and Panhellenic next semester.
IFC concluded its election process this week with eight new executive members planning to take office Jan. 1. Panhellenic’s transition to new leadership will take place Tuesday.
“My goal for the semester was to create a functioning body that would be able to move forward next year and do something positive,” outgoing IFC President Scot Rogers said. “I would like to see them take the greek system and go somewhere forward with it.”
Rogers said one of IFC’s biggest accomplishments of the semester was rewriting the constitution after it went from being a four-member organization last year, to having 20 participants this year.
“IFC last November was completely different in the makeup,” he said. “There were only four members and what they did was completely different, then they went through and changed the (constitution). That was fine, but we didn’t get around to changing the constitution last spring to accommodate the new makeup of IFC.”
Rogers said constitutional revisions including the eight new executive officers, presidents of each fraternity and two delegates from each fraternity composing IFC, as well as changes to the social policy and possible adjustments to the judicial process have all helped IFC function better.
Rogers said he’d like to see IFC hold more recreational events for the greek community and believes members will need to work on spring recruiting techniques after trying it for the first time last spring.
“I think Baker can definitely support two recruitment periods,” he said. “I think it is something the greek system is going to need to survive, and I think these guys can do it.”
Newly elected IFC President Andy Clifford said he would like to see IFC become an even more influential campus organization.
“I think they’ve taken a big step this past year,” he said. “They’ve updated their constitution and specifically their judicial section. I think IFC has more power now and is able to govern the fraternities. I want people to continue to take it more seriously.”
Clifford said he’d also like to strengthen greek unity among the fraternities and the Baker and Baldwin City communities.
“I want to continue to build good relations with the university and with the community and try to improve the perception of fraternities as a whole,” he said.
Panhellenic President Kaytee Clark said the transition of the 12-member organization including four executive members, four legislative members and four Rho Chis will take place Tuesday.
“The outgoing presidents from the sororities, along with outgoing legislative members and outgoing executive members of Panhellenic, will place the four exec members into their positions,” she said.
Clark said each sorority selects the woman they want representing them on Panhellenic; however, the four new executive officers select the legislative board members positions on the council. She said each sorority also chooses the woman they want serving as the Rho Chi, who shows no affiliation with her sorority during recruitment to serve as a mentor to new recruits.
Clark said last year’s restructuring of Panhellenic to include an executive and legislative board helped the women accomplish more goals this year, and she hopes the new officers will continue to make progress as a governing body.
“In the past year, we’ve been able to really develop the structure of Panhellenic, but next year they’ll really be working on implementation of the structure and just really building a presence on campus as a strong organization,” she said.