Fall 2022 Edition The Rho Phi FIJI Newsletter Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology Phi Gama Delta Fraternity President’s Corner Massive changes come out of 2022 Ekklesia with Rho Phi as an Early Adopter Some of the biggest changes to Phi Gamma Delta in the last 100 years occurred at the 2022 Ekklesia that 4 members of Rho Phi were able to attend this summer. The most groundbreaking thing that was approved was cutting the pledgeship period to 4 days from the time that someone accepts a bid to initiating them as a “stage 1” brother in the fraternity. The Rho Phi chapter chose to be an early adopter of this new structure, as the National fraternity believed we were one of the strongest chapters in the country to be able to showcase why this new structure will be best for the fraternity while reducing the risks associated with pledging and eliminating problems that other chapters have had with alcohol and hazing incidents. We have been working closely with headquarters and have been fortunate to have great people assisting us throughout this process. Already, we have been told that we will be shown as one of the best ways to implement early adoption and will be a model over the next few years while all other chapters are transitioning. WE NEED YOUR HELP Help by submitting your most up to date email address With some changes at Google, we have had to rebuild our entire email list of graduate brother emails. This is especially true for brothers that we only had an @rosefiji.com email. Please go online now to fill out this form (found at https://forms.gle/NFjrLgZW9frW6d236 or by scanning the QR code to the right) with your email address and latest contact information for graduate relations to stay up to date. Please do not forget to hit “Submit” at the end of the form to make sure we get your information in our system. \r\nFIJI Newsletter Fall 2022 Rush and Chapter House Update The Chapter is as big as it has been in the last decade standing at 106 brothers, which includes the 28 brothers who are living in the main house at 1121 S 6th street (which we consider full capacity these days). To reach such a size, we pulled in a new bid class of 30 outstanding young men from the Rose-Hulman class of 2026, with a few sophomores thrown in for good measure. This will be a great class with men who are active in and out of the classroom, participating in Football, Baseball, Cross Country, Track, and Grand Pre Engineering (aptly called Fiji Race Car). This class has already gotten its hands dirty with service projects and is on a trajectory to become a great impact at Rose-Hulman and in the community at large. For undergraduate brothers that are struggling to pay to live in the house or to pay their chapter dues, we have instituted a program where a portion of the outstanding money can be paid off through paid service to the house. This is done via additional cleaning, repairing, or extra service to the chapter. This has helped us reduce some outside costs while supporting brothers that have tremendous need. Athletics With the conclusion of the Fall quarter, there has been a great deal of recognition awarded to the athletes within the Rho Phi chapter. In Football, we had 9 brothers receive All-HCAC awards. In Cross Country, our brothers helped lead the Rose-Hulman Men’s team to win the HCAC championship, as well as a top 20 finish in the NCAA Great Lakes Regional. In Soccer, our brother helped the Men’s team to win the HCAC championship as well. Gage Smith helped the Men’s Golf team to a top 10 finish at the Stateline Shootout. These awards to our fall athletes only prove to serve as a testament to the athletic and academic achievements of our athletes and show the leadership FIJIs demonstrate on and off the field. \r\nFall 2022 Edition End of Year Giving: Pho Phi 1848 Club The financial health of Rose Fiji is back thanks to our graduate brothers! We awarded 8 scholarships in the Spring of 2022 and another 4 in the Fall/Winter quarter of this year. We have 11 fully endowed and funded Rho Phi named scholarships (see below) and four more partially funded that will generate annual undergraduate scholarships when they are funded to their complete $25,000. If you want to help finish one of the $25,000 endowed scholarships via a tax-deductible donation to the “Phi Gamma Delta Educational Foundation”, we would love to help you contribute before the end of the year. If you are interested in becoming a member of the 1848 Club (www.rosefiji.com/1848club) through monthly or an annual contribution, you can find details at the URL above. You can also find a list of past-giving to the 1848 club at this same site. Finally, if you have something specific that you would like to help fund via giving or an end-of-year donation or want to name a scholarship in honor of a brother or yourself, please feel free to reach out to Joe Weist or myself, for help. Wes Bolsen (bolsen@gmail.com) and/or Joe Weist (jweist@gmail.com). Thank you for all that you’ve already done and to all who plan to do something before the end of 2022. Giving details are below or reach out to one of us. We are still working to complete or add onto: - Bill Miller Endowed Scholarship - Tim Harlan Endowed Scholarship - JJ Boyce (In Memoriam) Endowed Outstanding Brother Award - Luis Pettengill Civil Engineering Endowed Scholarship (In Memoriam) Checks can be made out to Rose Fiji or PGD Education Foundation (for tax deductible) and returned to: Joe Weist, 2142 Wabash Ave, Terre Haute, IN 47807. You can also make contributions online by going to www.rosefiji.com/1848club Living out Morality, Excellence, and Service This year, the Rho Phi chapter has amplified the values of morality, excellence and service while continuing to build lifelong friendship and knowledge. This includes raising $1900 for Happiness Bag, a recreational and educational oriented facility helping individuals with disabilities in the Terre Haute community, through our Pie-a-Phi event which has become one of the \r\nFIJI Newsletter most fun fundraisers that we do each year. This is in addition to volunteering to help with homecoming bonfire preparations, cleaning up 6th street, and bringing back the Rose Fiji and Hanover Fiji football run that benefits the USO (raising an additional $1200 on its first year from extinction). With the changes in the fraternity at a national level, Rho Phi is stepping up to show that we have fun and build brotherhood while also contributing to the Rose-Hulman campus, the broader Terre Haute community, and to organizations that need our support. We are thankful for the generous support of our graduate brothers, our families, as well as the sacrificial giving of our undergraduate chapter brothers to help raise funds and serve in the community. Homecoming Weekend 2022 Homecoming week for our Rho-Phi Chapter was a great success on and off the field! The week started early with the career fair, with many Graduate Brothers supporting both their company and our chapter at the largest recruitment event RoseHulman hosts, helping current brothers secure internships and jobs! Fast forward to Saturday, where brothers on the field enjoyed a 34-point victory over Manchester University, resulting in a 48-14 win. During the game brothers, and over fifty grad brothers, were tailgating next to the stadium bleachers, with food, drinks, and homecoming day shirts for all the phi-gams, as well as for family and friends. After the game, everyone was found at the Main House, enjoying the post-tailgate dinner, and of course, cheesecake. The next day, Sunday, was our highly successful organized philanthropy event "Pie-A-Phi". Thank you to all of those who came out to Homecoming week, and participated in the philanthropy event, your continued support to our chapter is greatly appreciated. We hope to see you at future homecoming events! Please Reach Out Please reach out to Corresponding Secretary Aaron Greve by emailing agreve.rosefiji@gmail.com or Grad-Relations Chair Christian Cseri by emailing christiancseri@gmail.com for any grad-relation matters. Save the Date! Pig Dinner May 13th, 2023