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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.