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Zeta Epsilon supports Reading Is Fundamental, Harbour House, and the Kappa Kappa Gamma Foundation. Each of these organizations is very important to our chapter.
==Highlights of 2020==
One of the first memories of 2020 was welcoming our new pledge class! During primary recruitment our first round was to have the potential new members get to know our chapter by casual conversations. In this round we inform the PNM of what Greek life is like at Lawrence and what the chapter is like. There are posters around the room that tell the PNM about all of our major and minors and the extracurricular activities everyone in is involved in. Round two is all about our philanthropy. This is when we inform them about the organizations that we support. During this round we colored bookmarks to give to the children for a local elementary school. This is the round where we get to know the PNM very well. Round 3 focused on our ritual. This round is more personalized to the PNM by telling then how we saw Kappa in them. We initiated our 7 new members on January 28 and January 29. Our philanthropy for winter term was “Kappa Kappaccino.” We sold coffee and donuts on campus to raise money for Harbor House. We had our new member formal on the second floor of Warch Campus Center. We provided snacks and drinks, along with multiple backdrops for pictures. We had multiple backdrops for pictures. This was a great event to celebrate your new members. On March 12 we were told that campus will be closed for next term do to the COVID-19 Pandemic. This was a very sad day for everyone because it meant one less term with our lovely seniors. To honor our seniors, we put on senior sendoff that Saturday to say goodbye. The sophomores sang a song to the seniors. We did change some of the lyrics to make them more Kappa oriented. The juniors performed a skit for the seniors as well. We then fulfilled our tradition where our seniors give us their old Kappa shirts and we all wear everything that we are given. By the end, we are all wearing several layers of clothing and we take a picture. Our last day on campus was on March 18 which was the last day for the school year of 2019-2020.
Spring term was very different to everyone at Lawrence. This was the first term that was all online. To keep in touch during the pandemic we had Zoom coffee dates and other fun activites. We also tried to have movie nights on Friday, but we had some technology problems. Our chapter did not have a philanthropy event spring term due to COVID-19.
Our first chapter activity together was on September 20 which was our first chapter meeting for the school year. It was different than normal because it was all online. It was so nice to see all of our sisters for the first time in 6 months. We had continuous open bidding online with themes of game night and spa night. We got two great new members. Our VP Membership went to their rooms to give them a little goodie bag. We celebrated together with an online Zoom bid night. We were able to do a trivia event about our new members in the style of Jeopardy. On November 7 we had big/little reveal. To reveal who the big and little pairings, the bigs did a TikTok. It was a great change on how we normally do big/little reveal due to COVID-19. This term we had the privilege to initiate two new members: Kate and Lyss on November 14, 2020 in an all-in-one ceremony, with Elmhurst University, because of the Pandemic. We had our election on November 8. Genesis was the head of Nomination Committee and presented the slate that we voted on. Lexi Praxel was elected as our new President. Ally Herrera was elected as standards. Elizabeth Liebou was elected as VP Operations. Sam Tolu was elected as VP Internal Affairs. Jessica Hopkins was elected as VP External Affairs. Kate James was elected as VP Finance. Sarah Yochem was elected as VP Membership. Anna Kallay was elected as VP Membership Development. Marlee Matthews was elected as Ritual and History Director. The philanthropy for fall term is that our chapter donated money to Harbor House for their needs. We are doing this because other types of philanthropy events are really hard to do because of COVID-19.
Another obstacle that arose fall term was the movement of Abolish Greek Life. Our Chapter addressed this by having people from headquarters come to a chapter meeting to talk to us about the movement across the country. They also walked us through different situations on what could happen and where to go from there. The next meeting, we came up with ideas to improve and change the chapter for everyone. Also, during the meeting with headquarters, we talked about changing primary recruitment. We are currently in the process of adjusting recruitment, so everyone feels more welcomed.
Overall, it was a great year filled with good and bad times. We learned through a pandemic that has taught us so much about each other and about ourselves.
Chapter Philanthropies:
Harbor House
Reading is Fundamental
Kappa Kappa Gamma Foundation
Each of these organizations represent the causes that are important for us as a chapter to support.
The chapter included Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) training this year by adding a DEI officer. During fall term our chapter had a small committee that came up with different activities to talk about DEI. We had a speaker come to talk to the chapter about their experiences in Greek Life. We are also changing how the chapter does primary recruitment.
To celebrate Kappa’s 150th anniversary, we did the virtual ceremony on October 11, 2020 following a chapter meeting. Our chapter also decided to have the readers for the celebration to be around the country to show that we are together even when we are apart.