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Delta Delta

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|Image= [[File:Delta_Delta.jpeg|200px]]
|Founded= {{start date and years ago|1930|11|21}}
|College= [httphttps://www.mcgill.ca/ McGill University]
|Location= Montreal, QC
|Homepage= [httphttps://chaptersmcgill.kappakappagammakappa.org/deltadelta/ Delta Delta Homepage]|Media= [httphttps://wiki.kappakappagammakkg.org/index.php?title=Category:Delta_Delta Media related to Delta Delta Chapter]}}
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Our new home allowed us to have an amazing Initiation, as well as an amazing Founder’s Day. For our Founder’s Day this year we had a ceremony October 6, 2019, due to Canadian Thanksgiving during our real Founder’s Day. The ceremony took place at our new house, where alums and actives all came together to enjoy the day. We had coffee, desserts and fruit platters to share. We also pulled old artifacts, such as a scrapbook dating back to 1930, when our Chapter was born.
 
==Highlights of 2020==
 
At the beginning of Winter 2020, we held a game night and donut sisterhood event, and two successful mixers! Following the announcement of Covid-19 in March, all other philanthropic and social events were unfortunately cancelled, including out LC visit and Sapphire Ball. Meetings were moved to a virtual platform, and we still held a senior sister send off over Zoom.
 
Over the summer, to keep us all connected during quarantine, our VPS held sisterhood Saturdays that continued into the fall. One of our actives also started a Kappa Bookclub during the summer and into the beginning of Fall. Our Chapter created Covid Check-in Groups for the actives, so everyone could feel comfortable asking questions and reporting any break outs of the virus around the Chapter.
 
Throughout the semester, study rallies were held to help the transition to virtual university, and weekly virtual study sessions were also held. Meetings continued online in the Fall, and we started doing Committee Night in place of one meeting per month so that actves could have more opportunities to be included and participate in Chapter activities during the pandemic.
 
[[File:KKG Delta Delta 2020.jpeg|thumb|Delta Delta, McGill, hosting a virtual chapter event following restrictions brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.]]
 
Our Chapter was the first in Alpha District to conduct virtual recruitment and initiation with much success, we were lucky to welcome pledge class Eta, 18 wonderful women, with bid day welcome videos and a virtual bid day speed dating event. Big-Little reveal was conducted over Instagram with a gossip girl theme!
 
The week of the Sesquicentennial was also our Chapter’s I-Week, which gave our chapter the opportunity to celebrate our new members, the future of our chapter, as well as older members’ experiences and the history of our Fraternity and Chapter. We held our Chapter’s traditional Blue and Blue meeting, which incorporated the returning of the new member pin (minus the pins due to Covid-19) and sharing our happiest Kappa memories, on October 13th virtually. This gave all the actives an opportunity to participate regardless of where they were located and also to respect the Covid-19 safety guidelines. In the same meeting we did a Kappa Kahoot Game, to test our Kappa knowledge and to learn new fun facts about our Chapter, international Chapters and Alumna Associations, and the Fraternity founding.
 
Our Events Chairman planned and executed two virtual cooking events, learning and cooking as a Chapter curry and squash risotto. She also planned a virtual Kappa Murder Mystery night, which had amazing success! Our first philanthropy event of the year was unfortunately cancelled due to Covid-19, however over the summer the Greek community at McGill came together and raised over $20,000 for Demand Justice Now in support of the BLM movement. Our chapter also raised over $1600 for First Book Canada with online Instagram bingo sheets, and $645 was raised with a virtual 5km run/walk event for the First Book Canada Representation in Reading Initiative! To end the semester, PR started a 12 Days of Kappa Kindness which gives a daily prompt for donating to a philanthropy, supporting a sister, or doing a random act of kindness.
 
To incorporate diversity, equity, and inclusion into our Chapter, Chapter Council opted to create a new DEI position and committee to oversee topics that fall into this category. This team worked with other officers and the Chapter to promote the qualities of DEI, and have accomplished some amazing initiatives: during formal meetings a land acknowledgment is made, a PR focus on LGBTQ+, Indigenous, and BIPOC inclusion, and working to promote local BIPOC businesses on social media. Our DEI officer has also been working with other Greek organizations at McGill to help them establish DEI officers and initiatives.
 
This year Delta Delta supported First Book Canada and Demand Justice Now, an initiative in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. First Book Canada is our Fraternity philanthropy which we continuously support with our fundraisers every semester. This year we chose Demand Justice Now as a local philanthropy initiative with other organizations in the McGill Greek community to give local support to the international BLM movement.
 
==Highlights of 2021==
 
Despite the challenges of COVID, Delta Delta Chapter had a successful and eventful year, with active participation from its members, various new initiatives from Chapter Council, as well as continuous help and support from our advisors and specialists.
 
The VPO committee completed many projects in addition to maintaining the TWIK and Master Calendar. These projects included the Kappa Book Club, the Kappa Cookbook, and Kappa Awards. This past year the secretary sent out the ‘Note from the Secretary’ that recaps the meeting highlights, shares important links and reminds the chapter of important dates. The attendance sheets and meeting minutes were moved online to google docs and google sheets to be shared with other chapter council executives to receive real-time updates.
 
We welcomed 12 members in winter 2021 entirely virtually through COB recruitment over Zoom. In the fall we’ve finally had formal recruitment that was done in a hybrid format. This was the first time that all members were finally able to see one another in person in the context of Kappa. We did a rotation-style work week where groups had to go to the stations around the Milton Park area to participate in recruitment prep activities. This provided an opportunity for the younger members to practice their recruitment skills with the older Kappas who have been on the other side of recruitment. Delta Delta celebrated a Rock & Roll-themed Bid Day at Jeanne Mance on a sunny September afternoon. Complete with a DJ and “Born to Be KKG” banner hung from the gazebo. The countdown to the Big-Little reveal on Halloween was packed with getting-to-know-you events like Speed Dating and a Pancake Breakfast.
 
We could not host a community service project due to COVID-19 limitations and health risks. However, members have completed service hours around campus and in the general Montréal area. Some organizations that members have been involved in are Montreal General Hospital, Meals for Milton Parc, Breast cancer association, International Museum of Surgical Science, Arts Environmental council, MotionBall, Jack.org, Borderless world volunteers, McGill UNICEF, etc. Our chapter is also actively involved in McGill Greek life and active in other organizations’ fundraiser events on the McGill campus.
 
In October 2021, Delta Delta chapter hosted a thrift shop that raised over 1000 CAD over the course of a week where chapter members contributed to clothing donations, organizing, taking shifts at the thrift shop, as well as advertising and purchasing clothes. We donated 50% of the proceeds to Jack.org and the other half to Gabriel’s Light, an organization in support of suicide prevention and awareness, which is chosen by the chapter.
 
McGill Panhellenic decided to place focus on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) during recruitment by creating a DEI section in the Recruitment Rules. Unfortunately, due to time constraints, this section was not passed and will be passed onto the next Panhellenic council. However, this was still an important step toward an increased focus on DEI in Panhellenic Council (rather than just in individual chapters).
 
In fall 2021 Delta Delta chapter participated in three educational programs: an Indigenous Education program facilitated by indigenous activist Tia Kennedy; a Sustainable Students program facilitated by the education committee; and we were visited by Kappa facilitator Avery Moses who gave our chapter the Courage to Commit program: Behind Happy Faces. In addition, our chapter appointed a new DEI chair who organized two programming activities on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion for the chapter this year.
 
Operating in a pandemic: The year 2021 started with a hectic but rewarding transition. However, it came with challenges as the new office had to navigate all the deadlines without much experience in their new positions and being disconnected from each other physically due to COVID.
 
We continued to host virtual meetings to make it accessible for those who weren’t in the country and to follow all the provincial restrictions on house gatherings. We continued the chapter traditions of Broken Keys, Fleur De Lis, and supportive sister bra, which are all chapter favourites.
 
Events this year were certainly unique due to the outstanding circumstances of the pandemic. In the earlier part of the year, we held multiple events over zoom such as mixers and sisterhood events - even an online Sapphire Ball. Virtual events were held on platforms like glimpse and zoom and included a bevy of fun team-building activities like online games such as trivia, debates and Pictionary. After the summer break, we finally transitioned into in-person events that aligned with COVID guidelines such as mask-wearing and social distancing at mixers and using outdoor spaces for small groups at a time. There was always a virtual option and we made sure to put in place contact tracing and self-reporting mechanisms. Most notably we got to hold our Semiformal event in person after the dancing became allowed in venues (as per provincial law). Vaccine passports were also used as an entrance requirement for the venue.
 
Initiation winter 2021 and fall 2021 were both held over zoom. Delta Delta Chapter was honoured to have hosted over 100 participants from over 10 chapters across North America over zoom for our fall 2021 Virtual Initiation. We initiated 48 members from Epsilon chapter at Illinois Wesleyan, Beta Delta Chapter at the University of Michigan, Beta Psi at UofT, Beta Theta at Oklahoma, Delta Phi at Bucknell, Epsilon Alpha at TCU, Epsilon Beta at Colorado State, Epsilon Eta at Auburn, Epsilon Lambda at Tennessee, Epsilon Omicron at UC Davis, Epsilon Rho at Texas A&M, Eta Epsilon at Johns Hopkins, Eta Tau at Georgetown, and finally, Delta Delta chapter at McGill University.
 
For Founders’ day in 2021, Education Chairman and Marshal put on our first official in-person chapter event since COVID-19. We had sisters come in groups that met provincial regulations to learn about Kappa, have some snacks and take photos at our photo station. I-week was held online with challenges that encouraged the active chapter members to get to know the new members. Blue & Blue meeting was held with the Return of the New Member Pin Ceremony along with other Delta Delta traditions. As a part of the Inspirational Period, our chapter also held a pyjama-themed sisterhood event. Our marshal and standards officer hosted in 10-people time-slots and at two separate stations (cooking-decorating, sundae-making, as well as card-making) at the Chapter House and their apartment to abide by provincial guidelines.
 
We also held successful education programs and had significant participation considering our limitation of being restricted to a virtual setting for all of our programming: Chapter History presented by chapter Marshal; Student Health: Nutrition and Exercise and Stress Management programs presented by the Education Chairman; and we were visited by Kappa facilitator Kerry Mallett who gave our chapter the Courage to Commit program: Are You Ensuring Everyone’s Asked to Dance? Throughout the winter semester, we had two virtual senior sister bonding events and attended two virtual senior sister educational programs. The first was on Budgeting and Investing facilitated by TD Wealth Vice President Portfolio Manager Pam Churchill. The second was an Alumni Panel with four Delta Delta alumni from different fields who were able to give insight into life after graduation for our seniors. At the end of the semester, our events chairman planned a senior roast at our virtual formal, and the education chairman planned a senior sister send-off at our last meeting of the semester. While participation was difficult this semester being fully online I think our seniors and our chapter as a whole made the most of it.