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Each holiday season marks the times at which school attendance in New Orleans is at its all time lows. In order to combat this, our association hosts an annual Philanthropy Party, where alumni bring donations of small toys, toiletries, and healthy treats to support SciTech Academy, a nearby school. The gifts encourage students to attend school during the winter months. Each day that a child is in school is crucial to their chances of graduating high school. STAIR helps us organize events that facilitate schools in the area hosting these types of events. The falling children's literacy rates in New Orleans have become an epidemic. By being able to elicit a small amount of change in this is incredibly rewarding.
We started off the year with a great round of recruitment, again recruiting our one of our biggest pledge classes in history! (84 girls total!) Members proudly shared some of their fondest Kappa experiences with the chapter throughout the recruitment process. On the 15th, we celebrated bid day with a camouflage theme. The day was spent enjoying Frenchies Food Truck at the house, taking pictures in the photo booth, and getting to know each other through icebreakers and other games! The next day, all the new members enjoyed a fun day together at Sector 6— a trampoline park in downtown New Orleans.
In February, we hosted our annual philanthropy event, Kappa Klassic, for Reading is Fundamental, our philanthropy partners who work to provide elementary students with the resources they need to learn how to read. Members volunteered to table around campus during the week leading up to the event, spreading the word about our event that took place on the 18th. Member also held team practices to prepare for the event! The Panhellenic philanthropy event attracted several other sororities on campus, composed of teams of around 20 girls to participate in a Powderpuff Football competition. During this month, our chapter was also proud to report that our members had the highest rate of participation in the campus-wide student Sexual Misconduct Climate Survey, which aimed to help the community better understand the incidence of sexual harassment and sexual violence in Tulane's community, totaling in at 100% participation.
Big Little Reveal took place on February 19th. New members were excited to come together in the chapter room to find out whom they would be partnered with to look up to as a mentor in their years to come as a Kappa. Returning members were stoked to reveal to the new members who had been surprising them with gifts and excited to share their wisdom.
In March, members enjoyed different sisterhood events including Painting with a Twist, City Surf workout classes, and Poke Loa lunches at the house. On the 22nd,
Not my campus, a student-led movement to end the silence surrounding sexual assault and create a safe environment for all students at Tulane, came to speak to our chapter. We were thrilled to have the opportunity to support the organization.
During the summer, members participate in different service projects and internships throughout the country and abroad! Girls took on tasks from sponsoring Students in Zambia, hiking though Peru, interning in New York City and LA, and working with companies such as Teach for America and Eden House.
Excited to get back into the swing of things as school approached in the fall, members attended Shifting the Paradigm on September 19th, the campus wide sexual prevention program that reviewed the results of the climate survey that took place in February. On the 21st, members enjoyed reuniting after summer break with groovy themed sisterhood event serving snowballs at the house. After the devastation that took place as a result of Hurricane Harvey touching down in Houston, members rallied together to provide relief through GoFundMe and donations.
In October, we continued our tradition of celebrating Founders day with cake and a presentation from our Education Chair that covered the history of our founding! For our 147th anniversary, the Registrar also presented a brief overview on the little known origins of Louisiana Kappa’s unique traditional saying “Red Hot Mama.”
'''Philanthropy'''
On the 18th, we paired with another Greek group on campus to raise money for Reading is Fundamental and The Children’s Miracle Network, an organization dedicated to saving and improving the lives of as many children as possible during their time spent in the hospital. Our donations were used to support hospitals most in need of assistance. We sold coffee and bagels, raising a total of over $1000 for donations! Members also participated in “Panhellowen,” a Panhellenic trick-or-treating event supporting Star Advocates, whose mission is to build a community free from oppression and sexual trauma. We had a Leadership Consultant, Sydney, visit at the end of the month. Girls enjoyed taking her out to meals and showing her around the city during Halloween!
In November, we hosted our Kappa Collection philanthropy event on the 5th, featuring different clothing stores including Krewe, Lennox and Lane, and Lacey Ryan. Fifteen of the proceeds went to the Kappa Kappa Gamma Foundation and our philanthropy organization— Reading is Fundamental. We were impressed by the outcome and thrilled by the amount we were able to put toward supporting Reading is Fundamental. We also participated in Greek Groove on the 9th, a Panhellenic event that raised a total of S24029.12 for girls’ education and a future Circle of Sisterhood trek. Sisters had a blast working together to create a choreographed dance for the event.
In December, chapter members met at the house to take a holiday photo! The chapter was excited, as we felt that we had accomplished our goals to improve our structure and communication as a chapter, which allowed us not only to better support each other but also become more involved on campus and in our community. Members returned home for Holiday break excited about our improvement and ready to continue and expand our recent accomplishment with a new pledge class in the spring.