Carnegie Mellon Greek Life

Greek Week

By Hannah Post

This year, CMU brought back an old tradition - Greek Week. For the first time in many years, the Panhellenic, Fraternity, and MGC communities came together to compete in different events throughout the week to attempt to win the competition for their respective houses and to raise money for the East End Ministry Shelter. Events held were a Kickoff Barbeque, Trivia Night, Tug of War, Flag Football, A speaker: Chad Crittenden from Survivor, and two philanthropy events - Penny Wars and a canned food drive.  The events brought great participation from many chapters and raised a total of $1,200.

Each event had participation from all five Panhellenic sororities, four or five fraternities, and two MCG chapters. Danielle Fisher, a member of the Panhellenic Executive Board, says, "It was a great step to have all three Greek communities out participating in events together." The CMU Greek community doesn't host many events with the specific intent of bringing these communities together, so this year's Greek Week was able to unite the entire Greek community in a new way. Greek Events Chair Leonie Barrett says that Greek Week was a success because the governing bodies were able to actually host it for the first time in years, and "chapters attended the events and enjoyed them".

The sorority division and overall winner of the competition was Kappa Kappa Gamma, and Pi Kappa Alpha was the winning fraternity.  Each team won points for raising money for the philanthropy and attending or winning each separate event. The most popular events were Flag Football and the Tug of War, with high turnouts of both teams and spectators from participating chapters. Barrett says because this was the first year Greek Week was held, the atmosphere was relatively non-competitive and chapters were able to have fun together. Panhellenic, IFC, MGC, and all of CMU's Greek chapters look forward to continuing and expanding this event next year.

AnchorSPLASH!

By Hannah Post

Saturday October 24 was Delta Gamma's annual Anchorsplash, a competition with six aquatic events held in the University Center pool. Each year, the event is held to raise money for Delta Gamma's national philanthropy, Service for Sight, an organization which spreads awareness about blindness and provides aid to the visually impaired. This year, through entry fees Anchorsplash raised a respectable total of $500.

The competition consisted of six events: relay races, a spoon pick-up contest, a breath holding contest, a handstand contest, a belly flop contest and lastly a synchronized swimming contest. Each event was either timed or judged based on various criteria. Out of the eight teams participating, the team "Wet Dreamz" won the overall event. The team, consisting of members of the men's swim team, was awarded a personalized trophy, Delta Gamma Anchorgames jerseys, and iTunes gift cards totaling $60. The runner-up team was the Fraternity Kappa Sigma. Many Greek chapters were able to participate, including Beta Theta Pi, Kappa Alpha Theta, Kappa Sigma, Phi Kappa Theta, Delta Tau Delta and Sigma Phi Epsilon.

All of the 56 participants enjoyed themselves immensely and the sisters of Delta Gamma were very pleased with the turnout. Delta Gamma's Vice President of Foundation, Kristen Chou, says, "I think Anchorsplash is a great way to reconnect our chapter with our philanthropic mission. It's an event that unites the chapter to work towards a greater cause while having fun." The spring complement to Anchorsplash, Anchorslam, also serves as a fun and purposeful philanthropy event for the Greek community.

 Every team participating had a lot of fun representing their chapter or organization and contributing to a greater cause. Chou says of the benefits of friendly competition at events like Anchorsplash and the recent Donut Dash held by SAE, "Friendly competition gets people excited and motivated to raise money for good causes. It's also a great way to connect different Greek houses and give people a chance to socialize with people who they wouldn't have met otherwise." We look forward to representation by many Greeks and non-Greeks at similar fun events throughout the semester!

Photo by Jess Sochol

For more information about Carnegie Mellon's Fraternities and Sororities, look at the 2009-2010 Greek Brochure.