Conclave 2013

As is tradition, Conclave was once again a success. Conclave 2013 was hosted by Delta Chapter in St. Paul, Minnesota from Oct. 11 - 13. This year was one of the most successful conclaves in recent history, according to sentiments from both the executive board as well as from delegates of several chapters.

The format of Conclave has shifted variously over the course of the past few years, and this year's format seemed to work best for everyone. Friday night, while usually a forum for active chapters to give presentations, instead saw presentations from National Exec Board members. It also began with presentations from members of the Ag college. Craig Miller, the Alpha national rep, began the night with a DTS trivia quiz. In typical Alpha fashion, Alpha won the trivia game and was awarded bragging rights for the weekend. Other presentations given talked about risk management, budgets, website, and how to's for active chapters.

In usual conclave format, members were invited back to the host chapter for a social gathering. In order to be fresh in the morning for business, national members came to shut the gathering down around 1 am.

Saturday morning saw presentations from each chapter while breakfast was served. The "soft" opening to the day was enjoyed by all, as coffee, Mountain Dew, and eggs helped actives fuel up for the long day ahead. Committee breakout sessions came later, with good result.

The presidential committee, as well as other committees, discussed ideas of possible expansion. Possible locations for expansion are as follows:

Morehead State University
Idaho State University
Michigan State University
as well as possible others.

The publications committee discussed ways to "drag DTS into the 21st century kicking and screaming." They talked about scrapping the old website and creating a new one, possibly using Alpha alum Josh Steinmetz as a resource, utilizing Google Drive for important national documents and award applications, The Shield, and utilizing social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIN.

The nominations committee renominated current officers, as well as two at large positions: an Eta representative as well as Dave Dziak from Alpha. The nominations were accepted during the business meeting.

Other business meeting topics included a dues increase, in order to keep up with inflation. The dues per active member increase was originally proposed as an increase from $72 per member to $100 per member, but at the urging of Alpha representative and president Tanner Schoen, the delegates agreed upon $110, with the extra ten dollars being earmarked for an expansion fund.

"It feels amazing when you do something that truly changes your fraternity nationally," Schoen said.

DTS was also able to take a national photo, which will be shared when we receive copies. Photos of individual chapters were also taken.

During the banquet, Alpha took home the highest 5 year GPA award, and came in second behind Eta for highest yearly GPA. 

Overall, Conclave 2013 was a success. Brotherhood between chapters was increased, and actual business was accomplished. Alpha gained another national representative, and once again led the way for various topics such as risk management and new member training. 

Conclave 2014 will be hosted here, at Alpha, at THE Ohio State University. The date is tentatively scheduled for Oct. 11, 2014. If you are in the area, be sure to stop by.

Semester Update

We are now into the full swing of things for the 2013 - 2014 school year here at DTS! Things could not be going better for the chapter. In this article, you will find a few topics to update you as to the current state of things here at the Alpha Chapter of Delta Theta Sigma.

Rush / Recruitment:
"Hitting the ground running" is a bit of an understatement at this point. Over the course of the summer, members were in constant communication in order to plan a series of events. We have already had two or three cookouts, a few viewing parties for the show Duck Dynasty, and we have a Paintball event slated for this Saturday, the 14th. In addition, our efforts at the various involvement fairs have paid off, with a solid list of names that have actually been followed up with. At this rate, we have gained enough interest from upperclassmen to where we should be able to have a decent sized fall class, which hasn't happened in the past couple of years. Our men have been relentless in growing the quantity and quality of men we are pursuing.

Academics:
With the purchase of a conference table and plenty of high quality office chairs, our chapter room has become a hub of scholastic activity. Some fraternities require study tables, but with the dedication of our men, this space has become a study table without any incentive or force from the chapter. Members are constantly studying in this new space. We have also recently drafted our Academic Fantasy Teams to encourage competition for the highest GPA among teams.

Philanthropy:

Our annual Roast Away for MDA is planned for October 26, or the date of the Penn State game. The event is tentatively scheduled to be at the Wexner Center Plaza at the end of 15th Avenue.

Conclave:

Conclave this year will be held at Delta Chapter in St. Paul, Minnesota on the weekend of October 11th. As is tradition, we expect to bring home several awards. Conclave NEXT year is slated to be here, at The Ohio State University. Clear your schedule for early October so you can come visit the house while conclave proceeds. 

That's about all of the updates we have for you now. As always, be sure to stay connected to us in every way possible. Our Twitter account (@deltathetasigma) is updated almost daily, and is the best form for communication to the active chapter. Please also visit our website, dtsalpha.com, our YouTube page, Delta Theta Sigma OSU, and our Facebook page, Delta Theta Sigma OSU.

Alumni, please stay in touch! Feel free to stop by the house any given Saturday for football games, or any day during the week if your schedule permits. We love having you come back for whatever reason, so be sure to let us know if you're in town! Also, our guys are constantly looking for new internships or job opportunities, so if you know of any, feel free to let us know! Thank you all.

Aglympics, Relay, and Scholarship Day

This past weekend has been jam packed with plenty of excitement for the men of Delta Theta Sigma. Later this week, we will post more about each of these topics listed in the headline, but considering the enormous amount of content that we packed into this past weekend, we figured it was worth a short update.

Aglympics: For the fifth (5th) straight year, Delta Theta Sigma has taken home the Aglympics trophy. The streak in and of itself is impressive, but even more impressive is the fact that it was five years ago that Aglympics was brought back by CFAES. That, of course, means that for as long as Aglympics has existed in "modern times," there has been but one victor: us. It is astounding to have so much success in one year. With Chapter of the Year, the three others from Greek life, and Aglympics, it's hard to fathom how far we have come, and how truly fortunate we have been as a fraternity.

Relay: There will be more to come on this, but here just a preliminary report. The author of this article (spoiler alert it's me, Dave Dziak), has not heard any of the numbers as to how much we have raised for American Cancer Society. I know that this year has not been as profitable as past years. This year, Relay for Life did not fall during Greek week, thus there was much participation than usual, according to early reports. This author was unable to attend unfortunately, whereas in past years, I was able to be there for 24 straight hours two years in a row. We had a slushy machine set up as well as our usual pulled pork sandwiches. From what I've gathered so far, the lower attendance rates cost us in terms of profit so I don't know how much we ended up making, but our members were there for most, if not all of the time Relay was going on. I'll be sure to update you, but I can assure you that we did not raise $700 like last year (probably because I wasn't there to use my salesman pitch).

Scholarship Day: Once again, we had a successful Scholarship Day. I believe the total number of applicants to accept is currently around 14. At this rate, with our sophomore recruits, we will surely have no problem having a full house as well as an outstanding recruitment season. Again, I'll be sure to update you all once we get a final count on our scholarship guys. Needless to say, this past weekend has been ridiculously chalk full of fun activities that have continued to make the fraternity better. Look forward to more news this week, but we just wanted to provide a quick synopsis of what's been going on this weekend. Stay tuned for more news!

Delta Theta Sigma Alpha Chapter at Ohio State - Chapter of the Year

From former President Dave Dziak

In my four years involved with this fraternity, I have watched the culture of a fraternity change slowly for the better, but looking at it now it seems like it was all in fast forward. It's my senior year, and I can honestly say that my soul belonged to this fraternity for the past four years. I, along with the scores of members that have come and gone in these short years, have put quite literally blood, sweat, and tears into making this fraternity the best it can be.

When I joined Winter of 2010, I was blind to other fraternities and saw Delta Theta Sigma as the best organization ever created in the history of man. Admittedly, that was the bias of a freshly initiated member. Of course, it had to be, considering the amount of time I began putting in as opposed to other groups or organizations. I had never cared about something and so many people that much in my entire life. Fortunately, that love and appreciation for this organization has only grown over the years.

However, I realized once I came into leadership roles that there was still some things to be desired. I would not have cared about any of that if not for then President Nick Atterholt and his successor Jed Bookman. Through the one on one conversations and watching them lead with admiring eyes, I realized that they had set up a foundation for change.

From my understanding, Mr. Atterholt began a revolution. No, not like some communist coup, obviously as a true American I am not for any sort of revolution in that way. What Nick did was begin to look at the things we were doing and questioning if it was in the best interest of the fraternity in general and for the members specifically. He revamped the New Member Training Process to eliminate old, outdated practices that were putting us at risk on multiple levels. It was also a foundation that would give us the opportunity as a chapter to be awarded the Best New Member Training Process Award for the next few years in a row, as well as have it recognized by Nationals as a potential template for proper intake and training for new members. The work that presidents before me really set us up for a path to success that has accumulated this year.

(8/9 of the DTS presidents from 2005 - present)

When I was a freshman, at the urging of Jed Bookman, I attended Ohio State's Greek Life event: Buckeye Greek Leadership Institute, or BGLI for short. At BGLI, I was able to gain an appreciation for some of the things other organizations do, and how important networking between chapters really was. Upon becoming president, I had a few points that I wanted to accomplish. I wanted to increase networking with other chapters, work on our relationship with CFAES, work on our influence on main campus and other Greek chapters that weren't specifically ag, work on GPA, continue with the New Member Training Process reforms, resolve some risk management issues, and increase brotherhood.

Admittedly, I did not accomplish everything I wanted to do. In a short year, I dedicated every waking moment to improving the success of our chapter. Austin Kirk took over after me and continued on the path that our predecessors had established. He worked immediately on risk management issues, which was met with a large amount of push back from the active chapter, but was eventually accepted and instituted and eventually celebrated by Nationals as a model for Risk Management.

I continued to work with Austin, but took on a role as New Member Trainer, Philanthropy Chair, and IFC VP of Communications. Through these roles I continued to increase our involvement with other chapters and helped us raise $3,000 for philanthropies such as MDA, American Cancer Society, and St. John's Community Kitchen. I, with the executive team, spent an entire year perfecting the New Member Training Process. Austin continued to perform at the highest level of excellence and set the stage for what would happen last night. 

Tanner Schoen took over at the beginning of this year and began implementing new things to continue down our path of success. Our involvement has increased, our grades are better, and our recruitment is more functional than it had been in the past four years combined.

So that takes us to today.

Delta Theta Sigma is now officially The Chapter of the Year at The Ohio State University.

Last night, at the Greek awards banquet, Delta Theta Sigma, in front of a crowd of plenty of other Greeks, stepped up to receive the Chapter of the Year Award. 

We also took home the Challenging the Process Award for all of the risk management improvements we made in the past few years, Most Improved GPA Award, for our dedication to scholarship consistently landing us in the Top 10 of all fraternities, and Best New Member Training Process Award, for the tireless effort we put forth in changing the process from alcohol and hazing in past years to professionalism building with no alcohol or hazing.

At Conclave last fall, we won the Highest Yearly GPA, Highest Five Year GPA, and Best Publications Award. Nationals recognized our New Member Process as a template and contemplated sending us up to River Falls to Epsilon Chapter to train them on the new process. We were also asked to present our outreach efforts, publications, social media, and executive retreat. Nationals has recognized our achievements and have looked to us as an exemplary chapter for just about every facet of fraternity life.

I've been proud of everything we have accomplished during my time here, and I'm damn proud to say that I was a part of the team that won us Chapter of the Year for the first time. During all the sleepless nights and the outstanding amount of stress, there were always questions as to if it was all worth it. I am not necessarily a person that needs a plaque somewhere that says, "Hey, everything you did was for this." However, seeing some sort of validation that others have recognized what we have done over the course of the past few years makes it all the sweeter. I will be graduating soon and saying my goodbyes to my closest of friends, my brothers. Though it is hard to leave, and look back in the rear view mirror as a single tear falls down, I know that all of us have left this place in a much better position than where we found it. An even more gratifying thought is that the dedication to excellence and leadership amongst the newest members will continue. We have laid the path and achieved success. This crop of leadership is among some of the finest I have ever seen, and I know that they will continue to deliver results such as this for years to come.

Delta Theta Sigma Welcomes Seven New Members

Delta Theta Sigma is proud to welcome seven new members to the brotherhood. Members Mikey Estock, Collin Foltz, Ben Hoyt, Colton Harstein, Aaron Miller, Brice Schulte, and Tyler Prettyman were welcomed with open arms last night. 

(not pictured: Ben Hoyt, Aaron Miller)

The new members, eager to get involved and help out any way they can, took up a few positions already.

Brice Schulte will be the new Editor, Tyler Prettyman will be the new assistant treasurer, and Colton Harstein will be the new House Steward.

During some interviews with the new members, they stated how they looked forward to getting involved with the committees. While not all of them may have formal titles, rest assured that they all expressed interest in areas such as recruitment.

All of the new members have shown their dedication to scholastic achievement. Most times they can be found in their respective rooms, at all hours of the day, working on various assignments. While we have always had a strong focus on our scholastic efforts as a fraternity, their unrivaled dedication to course work should be applauded at the very least.

This initiation comes on the heels of three years of reforming the New Member Process. Year after year has seen additional implementations of various types of professional development. While the process is constantly evolving, the foundations of what we believe in are still rooted at the core. Additionally, more and more quality training is instituted each year.

Each class we share our excitement for the things that we believe our new members can do. This class seems to have a dedication to recruitment, networking, and organization. With those talents combined, I have faith that this class can be partially responsible for growing our organization's numbers to where we would like to see it ideally.