A MESSAGE FROM THE GRAND CONSUL - Week 9

Post date: Oct 13, 2019 4:21:33 PM

Brothers,

Keep up the good work. We will quickly blow through 17,000 members. Adding about a 1,000 a month. Soon we will have added about 3,000 brothers to the members of this page. That is 3,000 more eyes on what is going on in Sigma Chi and where are needs are. Get your Sig friends and Chapter mates on here.

Well, just returned last night from Sarasota Florida meeting with Fraternity Leadership and the Sigma Chi Foundation Board of Governors. Each of you should experience this. Being in a room with quite a few Sigs (most of whom are Significant Sigs) with decades of successful business and professional experience talking about how to make Sigma Chi better. Our young brothers might be interested to know that although the age is much older than undergrad chapters, we have quite a lot of fun joking and ribbing each other.

Today we are going to talk about TRADITION. Traditions in a chapter can take on many forms. They can run the gamut of a big brother giving a little brother a gift. Traditions that truly build on relationship building and relationships between individuals are a good thing. However, they can also have a dark side. I never cease to be amazed on chapters that are good chapters but have "added activities" they have layered onto P4B. Typically they are hazing in nature and the excuse is "This is a tradition at Zeta Zeta Chapter. Then they wonder why they get jammed up with the University or the Fraternity after a complaint is made.

Brothers, P4B is an award winning program. Sure it can be better and we will keep working to make it so. However, adding these activities to P4B in violation of fraternity policies just creates problems all the way around. Too many Chapter Membership Reviews started with this type of acitviity that led to something else that resulted in something horrific.

I have previously stated that I do not want your charter- I just want those brothers that find hazing acceptable to just knock it off or we will have to remove you from the fraternity. How is TRADITION a good thing when it leads to long lasting resentment and anger when a good TRADITION can lead to a lifetime of good memories and long lasting friendships.

Let the TRADITION of Sigma Chi Fraternity be about personal and professional leadership training. Let it be about building lifetime friendships where you know those guys have your back. Let it be about that when we meet for a 50 year anniversary, like Eastern Tennessee State this coming weekend, that what there is best about Sigma Chi is celebrated.

Brothers, we have a lot of work to do to eliminate hazing in our fraternity and the fraternity system. It starts with RESPECT. Respect a pledge as a future brother. Give him a rich and fulfilling pledge experience and foster your friendship in the years and decades ahead. It should never be about what someone DID to you It should be about what they DID FOR you.

That is the promise of Sigma Chi. To build CHARACTER and INTEGRITY in our young men. It will only happen with ALL OF YOU on board to this noble cause.

Please stand with me. Let's build a better Sigma Chi.

See the Facebook post here: https://www.facebook.com/SigmaChiGrandConsul/

IN HOC,

-Steve Schuyler, ARIZONA 1979 - 71^th Grand Consul