Oath

Rather than talking out the side of my neck and having my thoughts swirl through my head, I decided to take the true definition of the word oath, and break down the definition and apply it in our everyday rituals in our respective fraternities and sororoties. Now oath as defined by Merriam-Webster as a solemn usually formal calling upon God or a god to witness to the truth of what one says or to witness that one sincerely intends to do what one say. Now think about this, an oath is basically an act that is witnessed by God to uphold your word. Now what is your word in terms of your fraternity. What did you promise to do before God in terms to make your organization better or to hold yourself to the standards that your founder members set out before. Making an oath is important because once it's set, its up to you to make sure that your standards are in tune with the standards of your organization. I feel that you really can't be a productive member of your organization unless you uphold the oath. Now let's go back and see what kinds of oaths you took when you became a member of your organization. For me, I know I took an oath to become a catalyst for change and to help my community in any way that I can. So for me that's what I need to make sure I never turn my back on what I promised to do.

My secret thoughts on Ritual

It's funny because the title of this blog embodies exactly what I consider what rituals are supposed to be. They are supposed to be secret. They are supposed to something that only the members of your fraternity hold near to their hearts that they wouldn't want the rest of the world knowing. Rituals are what make our fraternities and sororities unique in the sense that everyone has different beliefs. Our rituals are what molds us into productive members of our fraternities and sororities. I feel that our rituals are kept secret because as a fraternity, there are special indicators that we can secretly identify if one is a member or not. If it weren't for this rituals, technically anyone and everyone could pretend to be a member, then what would the purpose be on joining. The thoughts on rituals that was given in the video were insightful, and they explain the definition of ritual in whole, but I think that ritual is deeper than that.

What did we do today….or last week?

First of all, I have to be completely honest; I wasn’t in class last Friday to even have a good or knowledgeable answer to this question so this will be relatively short but don't worry I will make up for it later. but rather than just taking this assignment on the chin, I asked some of my peers who did come to class and participate what they did, and I decided to really dig deep and find out why we had to do this. It was cold that day so I’m glad I didn’t walk around, but all jokes aside here is what I got from last class. We went out as a class to Sorority and Fraternity Row on High and 15th and we talked to members of different Greek fraternities and sororities and asked their opinions about what they felt that their organization stood for in terms of their values and rituals. Now just with that background information, I came up with reasons as to why this particular task had a deeper meaning. First off, we talked about values in class. The values that we looked for in a council were what we felt that were important to our success. What you have to realize is that every Greek organization has the same moral principles and objectives, we just have different ways of obtaining it.

Why We chose a service Project

I feel that the theme of last week's class was to pay it forward, but in order to truly understand that theme, we had to do something where we would not be able to get something back for what we did. It was truly a selfless act where we did something not for personal gain or reward, but we did something because we can. I feel at the end of the day, that project embodied why we all joined a fraternity or sorority. We are all in a position to do something because we are looked at among the community to serve others and make a difference in the world. It might have been something minor, but in the long run, we must not make light of how many people our project might touch that we wont know about, and should we know about those lives, no. We should be able to do things like that everyday, especially now with the crisis in Haiti. We should be moved to do more as members of these organizations and use our voices to reach out to others that can do more as well. We, however must set the example and I feel with making the sandwiches, we made a small step in order to achieve a larger goal. There was a lot that I learned from this project about the students from other councils. I learned at the end of the day, we are all students, but we truly don't know the power that we hold by just doing something small. At first, everyone in the room did not know one another expect from their respective councils, but after it was all said and done, we all came together to accomplish a goal that we collectively felt needed and should be done. That's how we are supposed to work as councils. There isn't any reason that we should not know one another now being that we are a part of the Greek community, but maybe this class is needed for that sort of thing. I enjoyed working with the members of the other councils and I look forward to seeing where this class will take us...

Numero Uno

Hello everyone, my name is Leo Obasohan, and I guess this is my very first blog entry. I am kind of skeptical of this being that it reminds me of a diary but I guess it isn't so bad. I am a fourth-year Sport Management Major from Columbus, Ohio. I guess I will go right into the assignment. I am a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc. Zeta Chapter. Kappa is the second African-American fraternity ever founded, however it was the first that was founded in the Northern part of the United States. I chose this organization because at the time, I felt that this was the fraternity that suited my personality, however I knew I wanted to join Kappa a long time ago, maybe even as far back as high school when I saw my first step show at Ohio State. When I came to campus, it was the Kappas who showed me virtually everything I needed to know about campus, so naturally that's who I hung with and asked for advice. I made my decision to join Kappa my sophomore year, and I am very glad that I made that decision. The experiences that I have had within the fraternity are invaluable and the people that I have met have been very influential. I am close with members from different chapters in different parts of the country. It's definitely something that I would never trade. Now as for this class, I must be honest and say that I am not very happy to hear about it. I wanted to made a difference in the NPHC, but I had envisioned a different way of doing it. Taking a class to build leadership to me is a dumb idea. Leadership isn't something that you teach, it's a characteristic that has to be shown in someone. I don't agree with the class as a whole,but I am always willing to meet new people and gain new experiences and see life from another perspective. As for the Blogabus, I would much rather have a paper one in my hands that way I can refer to it at any time. I see the reasoning for having it as a blog being that everyone more or less lives on the internet, however we are still in college. All in all, I am excited to see how this quarter goes and I am very interested to meeting people in the other fraternal councils.