Citizenship

Citizenship is defined in our text as, "centering on active community participation as a result of responsibility to the communities in which people live."

The text makes sure to state that citizenship in the context of the leadership model means more than just membership within a certain community but active participation in that community.  It states that citizenship when used in this context means social or civic responsibility.

The number one way that I feel I display citizenship within the fraternity sorority community would be through communication and inclusion.  Fraternity and sorority life is at times looked down upon because there is so much hatred and dislike between other fraternities and sororities.  This casts a negative light on our fraternity/sorority community as a whole, people tend to forget the positive things that we do as a result and when all people see is negativity it doesn't allow us to show just how important being good citizens is to our community as a whole.  Service is definitely another way in which I try to display citizenship within the fraternity/sorority community.  Trying to give back time and service to the outside community is pretty much a larger goal in our community but it also helps lighten the perception that all greek life does is party.

My chapter displays citizenship within the fraternity/sorority community by trying to support and participate in other chapters events as much as possible.  We as a chapter have been trying be more active in supporting other organizations because at one point we pretty much kept to ourselves and as a result we weren't very well liked by the administration but we have come to realize that greek life is about more than just Iota Phi Theta.  We are all similar and all share similar values and experiences.  We try to participate in other organizations community service projects so that campus is able to see that we don't all hate each other and can be positive and actively participate in greek life.  If we all center on serving the community than we should all be able to do so together? Right?

I think service, scholarship and participation in university events are the three main ways that the fraternity/sorority community display citizenship to the university community.  Service and scholarship are two of the main reasons greek life as a whole exists.  Some people tend to lose sights of these values and it make greek life all about partying and drinking but it was for those reasons (scholarship and service) that many of our orgs were founded. These values aren't always put on display but many times they are.  Actively participating in organizations outside of greek life is very important and many of the leaders of other organization around campus are greek.  This is great for the fraternity/sorority community and shows just how important citizenship is to our community.