Delta Omicron Award Celebration Information

Please join the women of Delta Omicron for a celebration in honor of their National Progress Award.

We will be at Gabriel Park in Portland at Park site C. The entrance to the park is off Vermont Street. More information about the park and a map can be found at:

http://www.portlandonline.com/parks/finder/index.cfm?PropertyID=136&action=ViewPark

The event will be a potluck. Alumnae are being asked to bring some sort of salad or side to share. Please let us know what you'd plan to bring.

Additionally, this event is open to families, so feel free to bring them! There is a play area close to our site for kids and plenty of room to play.

If you did not get the evite and would like to or if you have question, email xixi.alphachiomega@gmail.com!

Hope to see you there!

Convention Wrap-Up

Hello sisters!

I apologize for the delay in the wrap up blog. I returned from convention and life got away from me.

Convention was amazing! It was wonderful to meet so many great sisters and be apart of something so big for our organization. I know everyone says this, but it is definitely something you have to experience at least once in your life!

On that note, my first big announcement is that our 2014 National Convention will be taking place in Palm Dessert, California! A perfect location to get as many of our Portland area sisters down for a weekend of sisterhood. It's a fair distance from the coast, unfortunately, but you can take a direct flight from PDX into Ontario, California which is the closest airport. Hopefully many of you will be there, I know I will.

Next, I'd like to touch on a few of the things we voted on at convention.

First, we elected our new national council, lead by Diane Blackwelder, National President. We also voted to seat the new National Nominating Committee.

We also voted on a few changes to our ritual. First degree will now be refereed to as the New Member Ceremony and 2nd degree will simply be termed Initiation. Our new member stick pin will now just be called the New Member Pin, as the pin is no longer a stick.

During this time we were also given the state of the enterprise address and, I'm happy to say, Alpha Chi Omega is in FANTASTIC shape. A few highlights:

- 75% of our chapters carry over a 3.0 GPA
- We colonized one new chapter at High Point University and have several colonizations and re-colonizations in the works for the next couple of years.
- Major increases in recruitment and retention fraternity wide
- Number of donors and amount of donations to Alpha Chi Omega Foundation have increased

Speaking of the Alpha Chi Omega Foundation, we were introduced to a new campaign, the For Now, For Ever campaign. This initiative is attempting to raise 7 million dollars for the Foundations and programming. Currently, with very little effort, they have hit 6 million dollars of this goal! Each collegiate and alumnae chapter was given an amount as a goal to dedicate to this initiative. For more information or to make a donation, go to http://www.alphachiomega.org/index.aspx?id=2618 and take some time to watch the video. Delta Omicron President, Jessica N., is featured in the video.

Last, but not least... I am very pleased to announce that Delta Omicron was selected to receive 2 national awards. The first was in the area of Financial Management. The other is the National Progress Award, awarded to the chapter that has shown the most quantifiable progress of the previous academic year. The women of Delta Omicron worked incredibly hard for this award and are very excited about it. We will be having a celebration in honor of this award on September 22nd. If you would like to get on the Xi Xi mailing list to get more information, email xixi.alphachiomega@gmail.com.

That's it from convention! I'm happy to share more and answer any questions you may have. Feel free to contact me at the Xi Xi email address!

Loyally,
Brynn

Convention Day 3

Greetings from St Louis!

Day 3 here at Alpha Chi Omega national convention has been a whole lot of fun! We got to see our new national council initiated, retired our out going officers, voted on some important ritual changes, and so much more!

Lunch was hosted by National Housing Corporation and we got a chance to see one of our local collegiate chapters, Alpha Kappa at the University of Oregon, win several awards in housing!

The evening was highlighted by a DV walk around the Arch and plenty of fun and bonding with our sisters. It was a great way to end the day.

Look for Day 4 tomorrow!

Loyally,
Brynn

Convention Day 2

Hello again from St Louis!

We are having a fabulous time here at The Arch!

Yesterday saw many fun and important events, highlighted below:

• We voted to elect our 2012-2014 National President, Council, and Nominating Committees
• We learned during the State of the Enterprise address that Alpha Chi Omega is excelling! We were given copies of the pertinent information from that address, which will be posted and mailed out at a later date
• Alpha Chi Omega launched the Forever, For Now campaign, an initiative to raise 7 millions dollars by 2014. Each chapter was given a goal donation that will be shared at a later time

 I am also VERY pleased to announce that Portland State Chapter, Delta Omicron, was honored with a national award for Financial Management! There are still many awards to be given out and I will make sure to share if we get anything else, but I hope you will join me in congratulating these women.

That's all for St. Louis! More to come...

Loyally,
Brynn

Convention Day 1

Hello from St Louis!

Xi Xi has arrived! After a not so enjoyable flight from Portland to St Louis (the plane from Denver was just too small), we are settled in and ready for the fun!

The hotel is amazing and the staff has been great. There are sisters EVERYWHERE! They are expecting over 900 Alpha Chi's from all over the country, which is fantastic.

First on the agenda was a mandatory meeting for voting delegates. During that meeting we learned all about the how and why of the next dew days. We are going to be voting on some pretty important stuff, including our 2012-2014 National Council and Nominating Committee, as well as some name changes and ritual stuff. All this will happen in the next few days, and I will share more about that as it happens!

Tonight is our first dinner together and I'm looking forward to that! Stay tuned over the next few days for all the fun and sisterhood from St Louis!

LITB,
Brynn

Xi Xi Goes to St Louis

On Thursday Brynn, the delegate for Xi Xi, will be heading to St Louis for Alpha Chi Omega National Convention and she will be blogging! Stay tuned for updates of all the happenings and exciting events from St. Louis!

Also, just a reminder of the Girl's Night Out BBQ on Saturday July 14th. If you need more information or didn't get the evite, please contact us at xixi.alphachiomega@gmail.com!

Introducing: Girl's Night Out!

What is Girls Night Out? 

GNO is an all-ages alumnae Alpha Chi social group that meets once a month to reconnect and make new friends. Girls night out is not a business meeting; it is strictly social. We promise we won’t ask you for money or more of your time. We just want to see our sisters more often and have some quality girl time.

What do we do? 

It is different every time depending on who shows up. Sometimes GNO turns into a relaxing wine tasting or foodie adventure and other times we play bar games or BBQ. We have four annual events that shouldn’t be missed: summer BBQ in July, holiday cookie exchange in December, guys night in April, and Founders Day in October.

What does it cost? Do I have to dress up? 

There is no set cost; arrive early (5-6pm) for happy hour prices or come later for the full menu. Each sister covers her own bill. When there is an additional cost involved (parking, games, cover charge) it will be in the invite so you can plan. We choose places that are relaxed and casual. Most people come from work directly so we get every style from suits to Uggs to lab coats. Photo ID is also suggested since we sometimes sit in the bar.  

Who can come; is it only for Portland State Alumnae? 

No, sisters from all chapters are invited to attend. This is not a Delta Omicron Chapter support group! We know there are many chapter associated clubs that meet in Portland and we are not trying to replace those groups. So what do we talk about? Girl stuff; work, kids, grad school, men and we sometimes share “in my chapter” stories from college that are always good fun. Most of the events are open only to sisters but we have events open to families and significant others a few times a year. RSVPing is encouraged but not required.

When and Where? 

The group travels around the Portland Metro area each month, alternating nights of the week and east/west, downtown/burb locations. The first person usually arrives at 5:30 to hold our table the others show up as work and traffic allows. We usually wrap up by 8pm, but we have been known to break up and bar hop late into the evening. Facebook and Evite invitations go out about two weeks prior to each month’s event. The annual calendar is on the website for advance planning. 

Our next event is in a BBQ in July! Check out the Xi Xi website for more information or email us at xixi.alphachiomega@gmail.com for more information.

Welcome to Our Blog!

The is the first of what we hope will be many posts to the new blog for the Alumnae Chapter of Alpha Chi Omega in Portland, Oregon!

Follow this blog to hear more about all that is going on in and around Portland with our alumnae. We will regularly post information on upcoming events, things going on with our local collegiate chapter, and any other information that might be of interest to our sisters!

Stay tuned for much more to come this summer, including a special series on convention from our delegate!