Changes
→Highlights of 2014
After getting to know our new Delta New Member Class, Big and Little Reveal was here. After surprising the Littles at Avila Beach during their New Member Retreat, the Littles ran to go find their Big by matching their key to their Big’s lock. Big and Little reveal was followed by I-Week activities including donuts and coffee, a movie night and crafting, which were the final events before the Delta Class was initiated. Initiation of the Delta class took place at the Embassy Suites on November 21 and 22nd. During Finals Week, the AE Committee held a pizza party at the house in which we were divided up by college to allow us to get to know our like-minded peers and sisters a little bit better. The year concluded with nominations for the new 2015 council positions and a chapter-wide gift of a Alex and Ani Bracelet with a Fleur-de-Lis charm!
==Highlights of 2015==
Eta Rho has had such a fantastic third year on Cal Poly’s campus. Through philanthropy
events, sisterhood events, a new chapter council and many other fun activities, we are starting
to really make a name for ourselves as the newest sorority at Cal Poly.
2015 started out with a bang when the new chapter council was installed on January 4th.
It was a beautiful ceremony during our weekly Sunday chapter meeting that we welcomed 18
fresh faced and motivated woman to lead Eta Rho chapter. We are so appreciative of the work
that was done by the outgoing officers, and were lucky to have Leadership Day with them along
with the wonderful Barb Goettelman just a few days later on January 10th on Cal Poly’s
campus. On this day, Barb did some motivational speaking to the outgoing and incoming
officers, along with several advisors. We did a lot of ice breakers and the outgoing officers
shared tips for the incoming officers.
On January 11th, the Academic Excellence Committee held a banquet at the Kappa
house that was catered by Chipotle. At this event, there were tons of prizes given away such as
Victoria’s Secret gift cards for those Kappa smarties who received a GPA of 4.0 for the previous
quarter.
One of our favorite events that we hold every year is our Parents Weekend at the historic
Madonna Inn in SLO. On February 7th, we invited our parents to enjoy the weekend with us
starting out with a fabulous brunch the infamous Madonna cake. The following day we held
house tours at our spectacular house and showed it off to our loved ones. There was hot
chocolate and pastries that were paired perfectly with the Fall weather! This event is held every
year and is put on by our Public Relations chairman who always do a fabulous job.
With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, our philanthropy chairman had a fun idea of
holding a Galentine’s Day at the Kappa house. We laughed the night away with our sisters while
eating all kinds of desserts and making crafts. We also wrote Valentine’s Day cards to give to a
Senior Living home in SLO and hand delivered them to the residents. It really made their day to
have a handwritten note given to them from complete strangers! It’s little philanthropic acts like
this that we pride ourselves in.
Before we knew it, it was Dr. Seuss’ birthday, and with Reading is Fundamental as our
main philanthropy, it was only fitting that we celebrated it to the fullest! On February 27th, some
of the Eta Rho sisters went to the SLO Boys and Girls Club and spent the day reading to the
kids and doing crafts with them like making paper Dr. Seuss hats. We had so much fun bringing
joy to these children on this day and love all of the connections we have with local elementary
schools as well. We hope to celebrate Dr. Seuss’ birthday every year and support Reading is
Fundamental in every way that we can.
Happy birthday to Eta Rho! On March 7th, 2015, we celebrated the installation of Eta
Rho on Cal Poly’s campus for our second birthday (although our actual birthday is March 2nd).
We rented out the roller blading rink in Santa Maria and skated the day away with our sisters!
There was a delicious cake there to help us celebrate our special day that was put on by Danielle Van Skike, our chapter Education Chairman. Each academic class dressed up in generations, from rocking the ‘90’s with overalls to fun neon patterns and jackets for the ‘80’s. Today we reflected on how far Eta Rho has come and all that we have accomplished.
Every year during finals week we try the brighten the days of our fellow student body by
putting on Kappa Kappachino. For this event, we set a booth up on Dexter Lawn at Cal Poly and
give out free Starbucks coffee and scantrons to students! It’s always a huge hit and is great PR
for our chapter. We held this event on March 12th as well as March 13th giving students two
days to enjoy everything that we give out!
Our first exchange of the year was a night to remember. On April 25th, we danced the
night away with the men of Delta Tau Delta and Theta Chi at a Petra restaurant in SLO. With
“when I grow up” as our theme, our girls created hilarious, creative costumes from a chef to a
rock star! Our favorite part about exchanges is getting ready with our sisters and letting off
school stress on the dance floor!
In addition to this exchange, we also had exchanges with Beta, Kappa Sigma, Sigma Pit
and a fraternity dinner with Sigma Pi. One of our sisters, Bibi, is the sweetheart for Sigma Pi
fraternity, so it is always fun to hold events with them. At our fraternity dinner with Sigma Pi, we
held it at our house and ate yummy Mexican food. Complete with a pinata and a few games of
corn hole, it was a night to remember.
One of our favorite things about being a Kappa is the bond we have with our sisters. We
love looking back on all of the sisterhood events that are put on by our Standards and
Sisterhood chairmen. A few of these events include International Night at the Kappa house with
activities originating from different countries, spa sisterhood days at the house with facials and
nail painting, a hypnotist sisterhood on campus and renting out movie theatres to watch
premiers with our sisters. This year we watched the new Hunger Games movie as well as Pitch
Perfect 2.
Our biggest philanthropy of the year was on May 2nd, Kappa Kickball. We hold this
event every year to support Reading is Fundamental. There is a kickball tournament put on
where all of Cal Poly’s fraternities are invited to come out and play in a single elimination
tournament. This year, it was a red, white and blue theme and trophies were given to the
winning team! We raised a lot of money for this organization that is near and dear to our heart.
This was a huge week for us, because just the day after was the start of Greek Week! We had
so much fun with our Greek Week partners playing fun sports games all week and ending it with
Lip Sync, where our team did an awesome memoir to the Breakfast Club. This is such a fun
week for all of Cal Poly’s greek life and thousands of dollars are raised every year for various
philanthropies.
On May 30th, we had our annual Senior Sendoff at the Kappa house. This day is as
equally joyful as it is sad, as we say goodbye to our seniors. We hold “roasts and toasts” and tell
embarrassing stories of our sisters and reminisce on the year we all had together. There are
also senior wills which are items given from the graduating senior to any sister they feel should
be given that item. Examples of this are Kappa shirts, inside joke gifts and small things they’ve
collected from Kappa events throughout the year. The seniors then receive a stein that has
Kappa’s crest on it that is filled with little goodies. This is another event that is put on by the
Education chairman and it is always such a sentimental event!
Not only do we love putting on our own philanthropies to support the organizations that
we love, but we also love attending philanthropy events from other sororities and fraternities.
We participated in a ton this year, and had so much fun doing it. A few of these include Lambda
Chi Alpha’s Watermelon Bust supporting the SLO Food Bank, TKE’s flag football, Delta Chi’s
pumpkin carving event that “carved out cancer”, Phi Kappa Psi’s Sorority Soccer Cup
supporting the SLO Boys and Girls Club, and also attended sorority events like Chi Omega’s
ChiO Casino and Alpha Omicron Pi’s Mr. Fraternity which supported Alzheimer’s research. We
are so proud of the greek community as a whole and all the hard work that goes into a
successful philanthropy event.
It wasn’t long until school was out for the Summer! Our sisters had a blast spending a
few months off from school together and traveling. We got some much needed rest, and knew
that recruitment was right around the corner! Spirit Week was from September 7th to September
18th. During these two weeks, our Recruitment Chairman was hard at work raising morale and
teaching all of us the ins and outs of recruitment that was right around the corner. We learned
our Door Song, which was to the infamous Kappa Rap, played ice breakers with our sisters and
bonded before the stressful week that was ahead. Recruitment ran from September 24th 29th.
After a long week, we were so excited to welcome our Epsilon class of 2015 at our
baseball themed, “Sweet Home Kappa Gamma” Bid Day. We love our 88 new members! They
were initiated on November 21st at a beautiful ceremony that they will remember forever. We
now have five smart, classy, beautiful pledge classes at Cal Poly!
On November 14th, we held our annual Kappa Krush date party at Spencer Makenzie’s
in SLO. The theme every year is “perfect pair” and the girls had so much fun dressing up with
dates. This is one of our favorite events of the year because we get to be creative and shake off
some stress before finals.
We have had another successful year at Cal Poly overcoming obstacles that inevitably
come with being a new chapter. We hope to improve our retention rates and also improve our
chapter involvement amongst our members. We do pride ourselves in the awards that we have
been granted such as Cal Poly’s Outstanding Greek Council Member of the Year given to
Megan Minahan and Cal Poly’s Panhellenic President of the Year given to Hannah Heitzig. Our
sister Kelsy Koenig was also crowned Homecoming Queen at Cal Poly representing the college
of Liberal Arts, and we could not be more proud of her!
Organizations that we have raised money for include Jack’s Helping Hand, Reading is
Fundamental and Together We Rise. Jack’s Helping Hand is an organization in SLO that helps
children and their families if they are diagnosed with cancer or a rare disability. We held a
Kappa 5k Run and invited the community to run with us and raise money for this organization.
We held Kappa Kickball in the Spring that raised money for Reading is Fundamental. We also
decorated “Sweet Cases” for Together We Rise, a nonprofit that helps youth navigate through
America’s foster care system. Sweet Cases are duffel bags that are stocked with hygiene
products, coloring books, crayons and more comforting items.
The 2016 Executive Board will be officially installed into office on January 9th on
Leadership day. Advisors, ingoing and outgoing officers will be present to send the new council
on their way. We are so proud of all of the accomplishments that Eta Rho had in 2015 and are
so excited to watch the new council flourish and make Kappa the best house that it can be.
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