Five members of Theta Chi Fraternity traveled to Indianapolis to participate in the 2013 IFC Academy hosted by the North-American Interfraternity Conference.
Alexander Natola (2015) and Max Shuchman (2014), of Theta/Massachusetts, Ryan Elder (2015) and Reid Tedder (2015), both from Zeta Tau/Michigan-Flint, and Joseph Longo (Iota Zeta/Radford 2015) represented Theta Chi. Also in attendance were Theta Chi Executive Director Michael Mayer and Director of Standards Jason Handberg, who served as presenters for the Academy’s Advisers Track.
The IFC Academy, which took place Jan. 26, 2013, in downtown Indianapolis, is a one-day leadership program for Interfraternity Council (IFC) officers and advisers that provides hands-on training, assesses IFC effectiveness, and helps participants identify areas of strength and where improvements can be made. A plan is then developed to help participating IFCs operate more effectively.
“I was influenced by members of both my organization and other organizations to run for IFC,” said Longo. “They saw a lot of potential in me and said I was the best candidate for the job. I enjoy being in a leadership position on campus and being able to influence others to live by their values and ideals,” he said.
“It was a great opportunity to assess our current situation, and to learn how to improve our IFC on campus,” Schuchman said of the IFC Academy. “We had an opportunity to meet IFC [representatives] from other campuses and were able to exchange ideas with them. We learned about how to run IFC and to better the Greek community as a whole through community involvement,” he said.
“I learned how to recreate myself, my IFC, my campus, and my fraternity,” said Tedder. “With all of these steps, tips, and methods to building a stronger fraternal society, I am geared to come back to my campus with hopes of making it grow. I feel as if I was given the base knowledge of what to do and how to do it. Now it is up to me and the other members of my IFC to follow through with it – to make it ours,” he said.
“I enjoyed the IFC Academy,” Natola added. “I think it really benefitted our IFC Executive Board and I learned a lot about my position and how to run my Judiciary Committee,” he said.”
“Some things I plan on bringing back to campus, as well as my own chapter is that recruitment is a full year commitment, and that every man on campus is a potential new member,” said Schuchman. “I also learned that instead of working against the administration and community, IFC needs to sit down and ask them, ‘What can we do to help and work with you?’” he added.
“The biggest thing that I learned,” said Longo, “is that every IFC across the nation operates differently, and some of the tactics and strategies used by other universities could be brought back to mine and be implemented. My IFC and chapter are very balanced when it comes to power. The key is to influence others and lead by example.”
“The Academy not only assisted me, but also two of our council’s Executive Board members, as well as two of our delegates. Our council as a whole realized how severely underperforming we were by not only NIC standards, but IFCs among the nation,” said Elder. “Learning this, we asked questions about open recruitment, open expansion and legal issues concerning delegation of the Judicial Board. We now have goals to achieve before the semester comes to a close,” he said.
“As for the chapter’s well being, all of my focuses in IFC will benefit them immensely,” said Tedder. “I was thinking of putting my chapter through some of the IFC workshops I went through. We will see what time and effort brings us.”