The New Greek Honor Society Comes to Order

By: Kirstin Leih, Alpha Phi

Calling all Greek scholars. There is a new honor society here on campus just for you.

Order of Omega, the national Greek honor society, was reborn on campus last spring through the motivation of a small group of enthusiastic students. Order of Omega is an important organization on a majority of the college campuses in the nation, including all of the Big Ten universities. It was started in the eighties at the UW, but had been a dormant organization for the past three years before Greek advisors decided to revive the society. “We decided to bring it back because scholarship is an important part of the community,” says Barb Kautz, Greek programming advisor. “It is something that is visible to people.”

Society members have spent the past semester shaping the structure of the organization, building it from the ground up. Order of Omega president, Aaron Werner, explains that the group is setting the framework for the future of the society, part of the reason that he was interested in joining the group. “It was a very open thing to how I wanted to run it,” he says.

Brittany Bartley, a member from Alpha Phi sorority agrees with Werner in her reasons for joining the new organization. “We’re able to start fresh and put all of our ideas into action. We have the ability to do what we want to do with the organization,” she says. She also enjoys the group dynamic of Order of Omega. “It is composed of people who really care about academics and the Greek System. We have some very smart, creative and motivated members.”

The organization just completed its second membership drive with an extraordinary amount of applicants. In order to be eligible for Order of Omega, applicants must have a 3.3 grade point average and junior or senior standing and be a member of a fraternity or sorority. The selection process is different than many other organizations in that it doesn’t focus solely on academic achievement. “Some honor societies look for achievement in an academic field, we ask for achievement in the house as well as the community,” Werner says. He feels this enhances the group by creating a diverse group of interests. “They’re not all 4.0s,” he says.

Order of Omega provides many fraternity and sorority members with a new opportunity for involvement. Kautz feels that while not everyone can make the time commitment to participate in Humorology or Homecoming events, students can join Order of Omega because it incorporates their academic work. The organization also emphasizes improvement as well as achievement, honoring those who have worked hard to raise their grades or seek help in a class they are struggling in.

The executive board has many goals for the group, including Greeks tutoring other Greeks, highlighting academic achievement and awareness of education within the Greek system. “One of our goals is recognizing scholars, but also raising the bar for those who are not doing well and helping them to achieve,” Werner says. Kautz would also like to see the group do more to recognize Greek scholars who may not be in the organization with a banquet sometime this year.

Werner’s main goal is to eliminate the negative Greek connotation that is seen in the media and to establish credibility for the Greek system, not just here, but nationally. “I want to show people outside of the Greek community the hard work and levels of achievement people in the Greek system have,” he says.