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National Councils: Professional Fraternity Association PFA

Andrea — Tue, 25 May 2010 02:16:59 +0000

Thus far we have talked about the national governing bodies for social fraternities and sororities and Honor Societies. The focus of this post will be the governing bodies for Professional Fraternities. The Professional Fraternity Association or PFA.

The Professional Panhellenic Association, for women’s groups, was founded in 1925, and the Professional Interfraternity Conference (PIC), for men’s groups, was founded in 1928. These groups came about due to rapid growth among all types of fraternities during the late 1920s. On March 2-3, 1928, delegates from 27 professional fraternities came together inWashington, DC to organize the PIC. The PFA resulted from the merger of the Professional Interfraternity Conference and the Professional Panhellenic Association in 1978.

The merger itself was the result of the impact of Title IX on most fraternal groups with professional affiliations. is an association of national, collegiate, professional fraternities and sororities that was formed 1978. Since PFA groups are discipline-specific, members join while pursuing graduate (law, medicine, etc.) degrees as well as undergraduate (business, engineering, etc.) degrees. PFA groups seek to develop their members professionally in addition to the social development commonly associated with general fraternities. Membership requirements of the PFA are broad enough to include groups that do not recruit new members from a single professional discipline. The PFA has welcomed service and honor fraternities as members; however, Greek letter honor societies more commonly belong to ACHS.

Association of College Honor Societies (ACHS )

Andrea — Tue, 25 May 2010 02:14:29 +0000

We’ve been giving you an overview of some of the most important National Concils that govern Greek letter organizations. We talked about the organizations with a social focus. Today, we’ll turn our attention to the governing body of Honor Societies: The Association of College Honor Societies or ACHS.

The mission of the Association of College Honor Societies is to build a visibly cohesive community of national and international honor societies, individually and collaboratively exhibiting excellence in scholarship, service, programs, and governance.

The Association of College Honor Societies (ACHS), founded in 1925, is the nation’s only certifying agency for college and university honor societies. ACHS sets standards for organizational excellence and for scholastic eligibility for the various categories of membership: general, specialized, leadership, freshman, and two-year honor societies. To assure member participation in governance, honor societies must be structured on a membership basis so that the interests of individual members are advanced.

Member societies of the Association of College Honor Societies are as divergent as knowledge itself. From business to physics, mathematics to music, these organizations exist for one primary purpose: to encourage and honor superior scholarship and leadership achievement.

Stay tuned for more on National Councils!

National Councils: National APIA Panhellenic Association (NAPA)

Andrea — Mon, 24 May 2010 12:39:19 +0000

We continued our series on National Councils this week, starting by talking about the National Multiculural Greek Council (NMGC.) Today’s focus will the National APIA Panhellenic Association (NAPA.)

The National APIA Panhellenic Association (or NAPA, formerly known as the National Asian Greek Council) is an association of collegiate fraternities and sororities. As more restructuring was taking place, the name was further changed to National Asian Pacific Islander American Panhellenic Association (NAPA) to represent a coalition governance in place of a council. Although it began in 2005, it wasn’t formally organized until 2006,

The founding organizations officially chartered the National APIA Panhellenic Association on August 12, 2006. Today, the charter members include: alpha Kappa Delta Phi, Alpha Phi Gamma, Delta Kappa Delta, Delta Phi Lambda, Kappa Phi Lambda, Pi Alpha Phi, Pi Delta Psi, Sigma Beta Rho, Sigma Omicron Pi, and Sigma Psi Zeta

The purpose of the association is to create an umbrella organization that can unite Asian Fraternities and Sororities onto common causes, like the original APIA Vote campaign that served as a catalyst to beging the council. In doing so it would also facilitate communication between the various member organizations.

Stay tuned for more about other National umbrella organizations and councils!

National Councils: Multicultural Greek Council

Andrea — Fri, 21 May 2010 11:28:05 +0000

Last week we talked about the National Panhellenic Conference, the National Inter Fraternity Council, the National Pan-hellenic Council and the National Association of Latino Fraternal Organizations. This week, we’ll be visiting some of the other National governing councils. We’ll start with the National Multicultural Greek Council.

The National Multicultural Greek Council (NMGC) is an umbrella council for eleven Multicultural Greek Letter Organizations established in 1998. The sororities in the NMGC are : Delta Xi Phi Delta, Sigma Chi, Gamma Eta, Lambda Psi Delta, Lambda Tau Omega, Mu Sigma Upsilon, and Omega Phi Chi. The member fraternities are Delphic of Gamma Sigma Tau Fraternity, Phi Sigma Chi and Psi Sigma Phi.

The purpose of NMGC is to provide a forum which allows for the free exchange of ideas, programs, and services between its member fraternities and sororities. Also pivotal to the the NMGC is theneed to promote the awareness of multicultural diversity within collegiate institutions, their surrounding communities, and the greater community-at-large. In doing so, providing support as well as promoting the works of its member organizations.

Be sure to come back the rest of the week for a look at more National Councils!

National Councils: NPHC – National Pan-hellenic Council

Andrea — Sun, 16 May 2010 00:26:21 +0000

So far, we’ve talked about the National Interfraternity Council (NIC) and National Panhellenic Conference – NPC. Today, we are going to discuss the NationalPan-Hellenic Council. Which serves as the national governing body for traditionally African-American Greeks.

The National Pan-Hellenic Council, Incorporated (NPHC) is currently composed of nine International Greek letter Sororities and Fraternities: Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., Iota Phi Theta Fraternity, Inc., Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc., Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Inc. Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc. and Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc. The current members groups of the NPHC are also known as the divine nine.

The NPHC’s mission is to “promote interaction through forums, meetings and other mediums for the exchange of information and engages in cooperative programming and initiatives through various activities and functions.” The purpose and mission of the organization in 1930 was “Unanimity of thought and action as far as possible in the conduct of Greek letter collegiate fraternities and sororities, and to consider problems of mutual interest to its member organizations.” The organization was incorporated under the laws of the State of Illinois early in 1937, and became known as “The National Pan-Hellenic Council, Incorporated.”

We hope you’ve enjoyed yet another look at one of the National Councils. Stay tuned for more coming this week!

National Councils: National Panhellenic Conference – NPC

Andrea — Fri, 14 May 2010 00:35:41 +0000

We began the week talking about National Interfraternity Council (NIC). Today, we’ll be discussing The National Panhellenic Conference or NPC. The NPC is the other side of the coin to the NIC. It is the governing body for most main stream sororites. It provides support and guidance the twenty six member sororities or women’s fraternities with national and international scope. It serves as the national voice on contemporary issues of sorority life. It was founded in 1902, and is one of the oldest and largest women’s membership organizations today. Representing more than 4 million women at 655 colleges and university campuses and 4,500 local alumnae chapters in the continental U.S. and Canada.

Philanthropy is also important to the NPC-affiliated collegians and alumnae donate more than $5 million to worthy causes, provide $2.8 million in scholarships to women and volunteer 500,000 hours in their communities. It’s vision statement is “The National Panhellenic Conference will be the premier advocacy and support organization for its members, member groups, college and alumnae panhellenics and a proponent of women’s fraternity membership.” The NPC states their mission as: “The National Panhellenic Conference exists to promote the values of and to serve as an advocate for its member groups in collaboration with those members, campuses and communities.”

Stay tuned for more on national councils through out the week.

National Councils: National Interfraternity Council (NIC)

Andrea — Tue, 11 May 2010 12:58:24 +0000

There are hundreds of greek letter organizations. Their focus is as varied as the greek alphabet itself. The same is true of national governing bodies or National Councils. In an effort to present a unified front and to better govern the different entities of the same focus, National Councils were created. For the next two weeks, we will be sharing information about the varying councils. Today, we’ll talk about the North-American Interfraternity Council, commonly referred to as NIC.

The North-American Interfraternity Council, was Founded in 1909. It is the home for most mainstream fraternities. It is the trade association which represents seventy three Men’s Fraternities of both national and international scope. In its role as advocate, the NIC serves the needs of its member fraternities through enrichment of the fraternity experience; advancement and growth of the fraternity community; and the furthering of the educational mission of the undergraduate institutions were organizations have chapters. The NIC has a strong commitment to the enhancement of the benefits of fraternity membership. Today, the NIC governs seventy three member organizations with approximately fifty five hundred undergraduate chapters on over eight hundred campuses within the United States and Canada, and approximately 350,000 undergraduate members. The NIC is led by a Board of Directors comprised of nine volunteers from member fraternities, and has its headquarters and professional staff in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Check out the Promo video for their upcoming centenial banquet, and stay tuned for more National Councils.