As undergraduates, Johnathan Talcott and Keith Wysocki had positive experiences as members of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity. As post-graduates, they work to help give others the same.
Talcott and Wysocki – recent graduates from the University of South Dakota and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, respectively – are leadership consultants for the fraternity’s national expansion team. They travel to colleges and universities around the country to find future brothers to start new colonies, groups of students who petition Phi Delta Theta to become official chapters. For the past two weeks, they’ve been recruiting at the University.
“It’s the opportunity to start something yourself,” Talcott said. “You can create what you want to see in a fraternity and really have a legacy on campus.”
Phi Delta Theta was initially established at the University in 1912. In 2000, the international fraternity passed its alcohol-free housing initiative, with which the University’s chapter failed to comply, resulting in its suspension.
As written on the Oregon Expansion Q&A sheet, “Many fraternities have received the ‘Animal House’ stereotype because of their alcohol use and abuse, but Phi Delta Theta is changing negative perceptions of Greek societies on an international level.”
So far, Talcott and Wysocki have extended bids to six re-founding fathers, such as Clark Evans, a freshman business major whose father was a Phi Delta Theta during his time at the University.
“I’ve heard about his experiences so many times and in a way, it made me interested,” Evans said.
Bryan Flaherty, who is also a freshman majoring in business added, “It’s a good opportunity to get to be founding fathers and set our own values. We get to make it our own.”
The formal recruitment period, or rush, is normally a week during each term, but is open for Phi Delta Theta, meaning there are no time restraints.
Talcott and Wysocki are looking for solid academic records, campus involvement and leadership potential in their new members.
“Being in a fraternity, it’s like the ultimate internship,” said Wysocki, himself a re-founding father at UNL. “It prepares you for anything you’d be doing out in a career.”
The goal is to have the Oregon Alpha chapter, as the University’s branch of Phi Delta Theta is called, established by the end of spring term. To do so, Talcott, Wysocki and the University’s re-founding fathers must recruit 35 members, who academically must place in the top third of the Greek community. They also have to secure an alumni board, which will serve as mentors to the new group.
In his year and a half as leadership consultant, Talcott has helped form Phi Delta Theta chapters at the University of Utah, Indiana University, and Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., among others.
As a freshman in South Dakota, he saw Phi Delta Theta as the best group with which to get involved.
“For me, the organization was what I was looking for – a strong international fraternity, a group of men who were values-based, a group of guys I wanted to get involved with,” he said. “They were the top fraternity on campus and I wanted to be part of the best.”
Wysocki said his favorite part of being a leadership consultant is helping others share the great opportunity he had in college.
“It’s great to see guys experience the same thing I did as an undergrad, building the start of being involved in a lifelong organization,” he said. “It’s a brotherhood for life, as we like to say.”
Talcott and Wysocki will be on campus through November. For more information on joining Phi Delta Theta, log on to AreYouALeader.com.
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Traveling consultants trying to revive former fraternity
Daily Emerald
November 8, 2007
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