Theta Weekend

Last weekend was the 2nd Annual Theta Weekend here at JMU and everything went so well!  It really made me proud to be an advisor to this chapter, and neat to see how they've grown.  Friday night they had the Scholarship/Senior Recognition Banquet.  Aside from a classic JMU scheduling issue, it was beautiful and well put together, and they even recognized us advisors.  I was impressed at the number of both seniors and new members who showed up because in the past, attendance has been spotty.  Saturday I got to have lunch with my little and it was fantastic to catch up and hear what's going on in her life, especially a job offer with Greek IV at Clemson that her heart want's to take but her mind has to think over.  I'll be sad to see her leave DC just as I'm arriving, but she needs to do what's in her heart.  After lunch we headed over to Festival Lawn where our Chapter was hosting the DeKAThalon, their new philanthropy event.  What a success!  Many other chapters had multiple teams, Thetas were coaches, and there were 10 fun/silly games to compete in, and everyone was so spirited and enthusiastic.  Definitely a new event to continue on next year and grow to include groups outside of Greek Life.  The last event of the weekend, on Sunday was the Influential Women's Tea.  Last year's event was a good start, but left room to grow, and this year it grew!  There was another JMU scheduling issue, mainly with not having enough tables set up, but that was the only thing that went wrong.  Our philanthropy chair, her committee, and the entire chapter have so much to be proud of!  I got to meet some mothers of chapter members, looked around the silent auction they had set up and grab some food before the first speaker who was entertaining.  She talked about being influential and how sometimes you never realize when you've influenced someone, or how much you've influenced them, especially in your daily life.  Being a CASA is definitely on my life list after that day.  I also got a book suggestion called Three Little Words, another thing to go on another list! :o)  We also heard from the Director of the Staunton CASA branch, and then a fellow Theta from North Dakota who works to teach people how to network.  She was a great speaker because she got us up and doing things.  One of our challenges was to discuss the 6º of Kevin Bacon (how everyone in hollywood is somehow connected to Kevin Bacon) and see if in 6º we could get an audience with the Pope, meet a U.S. Senator and an award winning entertainer.  Our table achieved all three!  She also talked about introductions and how if you just say your name, people won't remember you as well as if you state your name, an affiliation, two things you do and then use an EST word (biggest, best, most important).  So we had to write our own, and my was

• "Hi I'm Christina, I'm in Grad School at JMU studying Secondary Education (affiliation) so that I can teach social studies (1) and change the life of a child (2).  The most important thing that I do is engage my students and relate history to their lives (EST)."  

Not hard, right?  So after her talk with activities we found out that just the silent auction raised over $2,000 for CASA.  That's not including anything from the DeKAThalon, cost of the brunch or any donations given, and exceeds what the chapter raised in total last year!  So everything put together from the weekend made it a major success and I'm so proud of the Eta Rho Chapter and how they've grown from last semester.  Can't wait to see how they do in Greek Week this upcoming week!