Changes
→Highlights of 2014
Overall, 2014 was an awesome year for the Delta Kappa chapter. Sisters continue to become closer with one another and also continue to foster relationships with other organizations. The sisters hold their selves to the Kappa values and feel they have the connection of sisterhood—a bond that can never be broken.
==Highlights of 2015==
The Delta Kappa chapter kicked off the spring semester with recruitment and bid day, and quickly after we fell into Greek Week in which we were paired with Sigma Chi and Alpha Epsilon Pi who donated blood and helped raise over $30,000 for United Cerebral Palsy. We also participated in other fraternity and sorority philanthropies, where we helped raise money for other causes through raffles, coin wars, restaurant fundraisers, auctions, and participating in fun events. It is difficult to judge how much money was raised for each event because a lot of donations are based upon individual contributions of cash, and are not documented in our billhighway system (other than entry fee and shirt orders). This spring we participated in events and raised money for Alpha Delta Pi, Alpha Epsilon Pi, Alpha Sigma Pi, and Sigma Phi Epsilon and won Lambda Chi Alpha, Pi Kappa Phi, and Kappa Sigma’s philanthropies’. We also contributed money and won the Panhellenic Circle of Sisterhood fundraiser. In the fall we participated in events and raised money for Zeta Beta Tau, Alpha Sigma Phi, Lambda Chi Alpha, Pi Kappa Phi, and won Beta Theta Pi’s Beta Blast Off.
Our Vice President Organization created an excel document with goals for Chapter Council created by input from the entire chapter on an anonymous forum. Chapter Council, or CC, checked in regularly to see if we were meeting these goals, what we could do to better achieve them, and what we may need to change to fit the path our chapter was taking. We planned a sisterhood trip to Disney World and got matching shirts made, and it was so fun we are still talking about it almost a year later! We had two sisters, Keelin Beelski and Rori Kotch get tapped into Iron Arrow which is the highest honor you can receive at the University of Miami. We also had sisters tapped into Order of Omega, Rho Lambda, and Omicron Delta Kappa. Our chapter also received a community service award at the AGLO Awards night, and we had sisters win individual awards.
In Spring 2015, headquarters visited us and told us we were going to be suspended due to our low recruiting numbers. This news came as a surprise seeing as we were in good standing with the fraternity before recruitment. The University of Miami, Delta Kappa, ad alumni community pulled together to support us, and a few days later the decision was reversed. This roller coaster brought our sisters closer together than ever and has encouraged us to work hard for this upcoming 2016 recruitment.
In the Fall we teamed up with Alpha Sigma Phi for Homecoming 2015, and had a blast participating in the boat burning/fireworks, building a parade float, dancing in Organized cheer, creating an ornament for the Spirit Tree, painting a Wynwood mural,creating a small scale model of the Intercontinental Hotel in Miami, and cheering on our football team to victory against Virginia. Our standards committee hosted our first, but certainly not last, cupcake wars where sisters teamed up to decorate the most creative cupcakes and win prizes. This event was a fun way to welcome our new members and get to know them better. The committee also planned a holiday party, where we had a secret sister gift swap and a cookie exchange for everyone to get into the holiday spirit before finals.
This year the University of Miami dedicated the Shalala Student Activity Center to our outgoing president Donna Shalala, and we welcomed Julio Frenk as our sixth president. We also recently opened up a new bridge across the lake on campus which was donated to the school by a sister of our chapter’s family. We also fired our head football coach Al Golden and recently hired alum and former quarterback Mark Richt. Our chapter struggled through the few days we were suspended, but we grew closer as a chapter in the Spring 2015 semester and went into the summer with our hearts full of love and support. The chapter came into the fall semester afraid of the future, but luckily our amazing chapter consultant Jessica Sitton has helped us through many of our problems and questions. We look forward to working with her, Jessica has given Delta Kappa hope for the future and has encouraged us to work harder than ever.
Chapter Philanthropy:
What organization(s) has your chapter historically/traditionally raised money for, or donated hours to, in your community?
All sisters are expected to participate in at least one trip to Branches South Miami community center to read to children each semester for our reading buddies program. We go there every Friday and read with K-5th graders in the after school program. We then spend time coloring and playing with them. At the end of the spring semester, we hold “reading is key” event at Branches where we bring two books for every single child in the group for them to take home. Many of them don’t have any books at home and struggle with illiteracy. They are very happy and receptive of the gift. We also bring them snacks and have fun planned activities for the time that we spend with them. All sisters are expected to attend this event. Throughout the year, we encouraged sisters to participate in on-campus community service events such as Dance Marathon, Funday, Relay for Life, etc. We have several sisters on the Dance Marathon and Special Olympics e-boards. We have several sisters involved in APO showing a large presence in community service around the area.
Our official chapter donations for entry fees, t-shirt orders and money raised for our own philanthropies are roughly $5,600. Overall, I’d estimate our donations, both documented and undocumented to be around $10,000 to various philanthropic causes. Dividing this total by 84 members in the fall, each member raised roughly $238 on average. We’ve educated others about our philanthropic cause during Formal Recruitment’s philanthropy day through a video presentation and through our social media and on-campus presence. During our new member education program, we also have the philanthropy chair make a presentation to the new members about our 3 official avenues of chapter community service/philanthropy, that is reading buddies, Reading is Fundamental, and the Kappa Kappa Gamma Foundation.
Why did your chapter choose this organization(s) to support?
Since we go to reading buddies on a weekly basis, the kids recognize many sisters and look up to us as role models. Many of them aspire to go to college already at such a young age and want to be just like us when they get older. It is always a very special time for us because we see what kind of positive impact we have on the kids who may be growing up in less fortunate conditions than our upbringing. This year we voted as a chapter to support the Alzheimer’s association because it was a cause dear to us. Alzeimers is a terrible disease that many sisters in our chapter are personally affected by, and because of the personal connection our chapter had with this disease.
==Highlights of the 2020s==
