www.tulanefiji.com

Todd Durand passed away this past Saturday evening.

There have been too many brothers that have passed from our chapter's brief history. Life is too short. Do everything you can to lengthen your time on Earth so you can spend as much time with your family, your friends, and your brothers as possible.

The Tau Upsilon Chapter will have its first official Pig Dinner since rechartering at Tulane University. It will be Oct. 27 (the same weekend as homecoming) and we will be having the dinner at the New Orleans Country Club. The guest speaker will be Archon Councilor Orsen Paxton. Invitations will be going out soon. Spread the word.

Dan Clark
Corresponding Secretary '07
dclark2@tulane.edu

check it out www.tulanefiji.org.

Chartering Weekend and hte Pig Dinner is moved to Dec. 1-3. The tentaive plans are for a Friday afternoon reception for the university and then ritual stuff that night. Saturday is the big day with more ritual in the morning and initiation and then a banquet/Pig Dinner for everyone in the evening with entertainment at night. The colony brothers along with their datres are planning on staying downtown at a hotel with the Archons and HQ staff. We will let you know as soon as we determine what hotel that is and more details to come.

Also, be prepared for a massive mailing within the next month to announce all of these plans!

Fraternally,

John Prather
Charter Chairman
Tau Upsilon Delta Colony
Phi Gamma Delta (FIJI)
Tulane University

Press On!

Chartering weekend will not be taking place in October, and it is likely the date for Pig Dinner will also be moved. The Hanover Chapter (the last Chartered) advised them that the event demands several months to plan, so it another date will be set. They still would like to have the Chartering weekend coincide with Pig Dinner. For anyone who had already made plans to visit in October, they are planning a graduate function for that weekend.

At the 158th Ekklesia in Minneapolis, MN the Tualne Delta Colony was unanimously approved for its charter.

Brothers,

Some of you know, that the colony is submitting their petition for chartering this summer, with hopes of receiving approval at Ekklesia this August in Minneapolis.

They have a preliminary version of the petition online, which you can view at http://www.tulanefiji.org/ The direct link to the petition is http://www.tulanefiji.org/Main.html

Overall I think they have done a very good job on it. I have seen the recent petitions from Ohio State and Hanover, and this is definatly better.

Since I had to ask myself, I thought I would fill you in on the process from here out:

The petition is first reviewed by the Headquarters staff. When all the tweaks, and suggestions have been incorporated, it will be forwarded on to the Archons. The Archons will take a position of support or no support. A petition is usually not sent to the Archons unless it is going to be supported. The next phase occurs at Ekklesia, Aug. 10-13th.

At Ekklesia, the colony representatives will meet with the Committee on Expansion. The committee will review the petition and the progress the colony has made since they started. If the committee is agreeable, the petition will be forwarded onto a vote of the full Ekklesia. This is likely take place on Saturday Aug. 12. Again, a petition that will not be accepted is usually is not sent on to the Ekklesia. Once it passes the colony representatives will be brought into the room before the full Ekklesia and told the outcome of the vote. As you might imagine the entire Ekklesia erupts into celebration.

From there, a chartering date will be set, which at the present time will be the Pig Dinner weekend of Oct. 20-22nd. There will be more on this later.

Greg Hackenberg

Pig Dinner/Chartering Weekend

Pig Dinner Weekend/Graduate Weekend?Chartering Weekend? on October 20-22, 2006 at Tulane in New Orleans!

Colony Update....and new website-----www.tulanefiji.org

Just wanted to let everyone know that most of our New Orleans area graduates are accounted for and safe.

Note that forwarding for those with tulanealumni.net e-mail addresses no longer works so you might want to give me an alternate address for the mailing list @ tulanefiji@tulanefiji.com.

If you're a FIJI graduate/undergraduate from the New Orleans area (Tau Upsilon or not), please post a comment to let us know you are alright. Please note that you do not have to sign up for an account to post comments.

Dear Graduates,

Here is an update of the dealings of the Tau Upsilon Delta Colony this semester. We started out the semester with the first freshman rush of the colony. We had a successful Spring recruitment period and extended 13 bids to freshmen and sophomores. We put a new pledge program into place for the new Gamma class. We were able to initiate 12 quality men, 9 freshmen and 3 sophomores on April 21. There are currently 43 initiated brothers in the Delta Colony. The new pledge class has added to the chemistry of the group and everyone is quite excited to start focusing more on the charter in the upcoming year.

Hugh Meighan T'96 and wife Jennifer had their second baby (first boy) on Monday April 11 at 2:53pm, just in time for the fenway home opener. Hugh Joseph weighed in at 8lbs 15oz and was 20.5" long. both baby and mom are now home and doing fine.

Brothers,

The Colony is currently short one Graduate Relations Chairman, so I am taking the initiative to let you know that the colony has scheduled this year's Pig Dinner for Homecoming Weekend, September 30 to October 2. The Colony will send out announcements in the immediate future. Meanwhile, the tentative schedule is below:

Well, after a long time trying to dodge the bullet, I have finally found the woman of my dreams and am getting married.

Just updated the tulanefiji.com photo gallery software. Its pretty easy to use so feel free to add photos.

This might be a nice option for those of you that use Ofoto (or other similar services) to post pictures of your kids that no one ever really looks at because you have to register first.

Just updated the site to the lastet version of the PostNUKE CMS. Let me know if you experience any problems.

Just posted a copy of the latest Field Secretary's report online. You can view it here.

Back in July of 2004 I had to modify the permission system on this site to require users to register in order to make comments because of problems with spam. This had the negative side effect of blocking unregistered users from both submitting news and, moreover, trying to register!

Everything should be fixed now, and I apologize for any inconvenience.

Once again, anyone can submit news to this site.

Dear Graduate Brothers,Tonight, the Delta Colony formally pledged our beta class of eleven upperclassmen selected from among twenty candidates. That is the strongest showing of any Tulane Fraternity this semester. We have a goal of twenty-five pledges during freshman rush in the spring. If we meet this goal, we are well o­n our way to being the largest fraternity o­n campus which is o­ne of the requirements for a charter. We are also developing a quality organization that seeks to provide our fraternity members with academic and personal support. Our hopes are to prevent member attrition by providing real benefits in addition to social opportunities.I am very proud of our Delta Colony.

Fraternally,
Richard Clark

Press o­n!

FIJI Tau Upsilon Brothers,

Thank you so much for offering your support to me during my battle with testicular cancer. It means the world to me to have so many Brothers come forward and offer advice, consolation, and perspective regarding my trying situation. For the many of you that have taken the time to post Guestbook messages to me at http://www3.caringbridge.org/mo/snyder/ or who have sent e-mail correspondence directly to me at sasnyberg@sbcglobal.net, I sincerely appreciate the support and encouragement that you all have provided. You have no idea how moving it is to hear from Brothers that I have fallen out of touch with over the past several years.

I do regret that it took my battle with cancer for several of us to begin to communicate with each other again. But, if it is possible to take anything positive away from this experience, I would certainly love to see our Brotherhood continue to flourish in congruence with the new Re-Colonization effort. Several of you posted indicative messages on my Guestbook stating:
"I look forward to seeing you at a graduate dinner in New Orleans in the near future." - Brian Pangburn
* "I am counting on seeing you at some sort of reunion in the near future and meeting your family." - Partying Feinberg
* "wishing you a quick recovery and am looking forward to seeing you soon, if that "slack" colony gets a pig dinner going" - Hugh Meighan,
* "Look forward to seeing you in the Big Sleazy for a Graduate Dinner when it comes together". - Adam Sloat
* "Seguro que vas a salir de esto, así que no te preocupes y que sepas que estamos contigo." (Translation anyone ?????) - Luis Fernandez
* "Sounds like we're building consensus for a reunion in New Orleans. " from Phil Webb.
* I would love nothing more (other than beating cancer of course) than to have our Brotherhood revitalized. I'd love to have a reason to head down to New Orleans again to be with PhiGam brothers, and watch the newest inductees bite the tail off of a pig with hot sauce dripping down their mouths. I would love to see the Recolonization really get an opportunity to meet their predecessors and for us to be able to pass along some of the lineage of our FIJI experiences to the many new brothers.

Again, it has been overwhelming to receive the vast support from so many PhiGam Brothers all over the world (i.e. Luis Fernandez in Spain and Chris Clay in Iraq). You all have truly exemplified that Phi Gamma Delta is "Not for College Days Alone". You have taken the initiative to be friends, to serve your Brother by offering support and guidance, to showcase your strong values and finally -- to strive for excellence. If I still had my 5 values card tucked away in my wallet, I'd be supremely confident that your actions and outreach of support toward me and my situation over the past few days have personified what our Tau Upsilon - FIJI experience was all about. Your actions have provided a remarkable reflection on the values and purposes of our Fraternity.

So, I hereby send a ringing round of appreciation to all of my FIJI Tau Upsilon Brothers. Click-Click-Click.

I sincerely hope that we can all be together soon, perhaps over Homecoming weekend this October, reliving our glorious experiences as proud Brothers in Phi Gamma Delta.

"I love all my brothers, and I am DAMNED PROUD to be a FIJI."

Brother Alan "Dawg" Snyder (B '95)

Perge!

Dear Brothers,

I am not sure who has this information since I am currently in Iraq, but Alan "Dawg" Snyder, currently has cancer and has just underwent his first chemo therapy o­n 30th of August. Please keep him and his wife, Sharon, in your prayers. To find out more information his family has set up a website to track his progress.

Fraternally,
Chris Clay

Perge!

Dear Graduate Brothers,

We have a permanent mailing address for the Delta Colony. All mail should be directed to:

Phi Gamma Delta, Tulane Delta Colony
Box 572
6221 S. Claiborne Avenue
New Orleans, Louisiana 70125

Best,
Richard Clark

Press on!

Congratulations to Brian and all those who helped make the re-colonization of Tau Upsilon possible! The effort is off to a great start. Keep up the good work!

For anyone not familiar with the history of Phi Gamma Delta, the Fraternity's Curator of Archives (Towner Blackstock) has done a tremendous job compiling history articles, photos, etc on the official "History" website. There is much to see. Here's the link:

Archives

If you have something you'd like to add to that site (official history of Tau Upsilon, prominent alumni, etc) , I'm sure Towner would want to hear from you.

I'm not in any "official" capacity in the Fraternity. Just a graduate Brother.

You guys are doing great. Work hard, enjoy life but don't forget why you're at college.

Not for college days alone,
Robert

Perge!

I've just upgraded the site to the latest version of PostNUKE complete with the latest security patches.

If you notice any problems, please post them as comments to this article.

Brothers:

The colony pledges are meeting and trying to get their affairs in order before the end of the semester. The Cabinet was elected last week, and several of the primary committees have been formed. You should be receiving something from the new Graduate Relations committee soon. These are a great bunch of guys, and I think you all would be impressed with their energy and desire to re-establish Fiji at Tulane.

Brothers,

It is my privilege to announce that last evening 35 men were pledged to the Delta Colony at Tulane University.

Needless to say, 35 is an amazing number, as many of us can recall the chapter with a total active membership of around this number. This represents the second largest initial recruiting class in at least the last ten years of expansion efforts. This certainly will allow the colony to begin with a good degree of financial stability and a strong presence on campus.

In addition there are still interested men on campus, who either came into the process too late or were not selected by the expansion team. This does not mean these men were somehow lacking; the selection criteria for expansion is not necessarily who would be a good addition to a chapter, but is mostly concerned with selecting those who can establish the colony/chapter as successfully as possible. So the prospects for future recruiting look very good.

The colony pledges will begin by selecting a cabinet, which, due to the Easter holiday, is scheduled to take place next weekend. As you can imagine, there is a great deal of excitement and a large number of likely candidates.

Again, I would ask you to support this new start at Tulane in whatever way you can.

Greg Hackenberg

Pergé

Dear Graduate Brothers,

The recruitment effort led by JB Goll and JR Johnson has exceeded my own hopes and proceeds incredibly well. We wish you were here, but since most of you cannot be, I am posting photos of recruitment events on a daily basis at the colony web site.

Sincerely,
Richard Clark

Josh Morita, Director of Expansion for Phi Gamma Delta, provided me with the following information regarding the fund raising effort for the new colony. Looks like our fund raising goal will be $5000 and we will receive a full accounting of all expenditures.

The financial commitment of $5,000 from the Tau Upsilon House Corporation (graduates) will be combined with the financial commitment from Headquarters of $5,000. These funds are to be used for:

Transportation costs for Headquarters expansion team
Accommodation and meals expense for Headquarters expansion team
Entertainment expenses for sorority women (including roses, meals, thank you gifts, etc.)
Entertainment expenses for recruitment prospects (meals, facility rental, sporting events, etc.)
Administrative costs for mailing letters, printing promotional materials, printing information materials, etc.

I hope this offers some clarity regarding use of funds. We do keep a detailed record of all expenses and can forward these to the Tau Upsilon house corporation at the end of the expansion to justify the $5,000 invoice that would follow.

I just received word from Josh Morita @ International Headquarters that the Archons approved the Petition to Recolonize FIJI @ Tulane. The full letter appears below.

The big issue now is funding. The new colony will need graduate donations to get off the ground. I have added a link at the top left of the site so that the House Corp. can accept PayPal donations on behalf of the colony. Alternately, you can send checks to:

Tau Upsilon House Corporation
P.O. Box 900
New Roads, LA 70760-0900

Brothers,

I am pleased to tell you that a re-colonization effort at Tulane has been given the go ahead by Josh Morita, the Director of Expansion. The only step remaining is approval by the Archons.

Josh spent several days speaking with the Director Greek affairs, University officials, IFC representatives, Richard Clark, and the group of interested men, as well as local Fiji's. He is confident that the climate at Tulane is right, that the interest group represents quality men who can take on the challenge, the housing issue is not insurmountable, and the local graduate support WILL be adequate to support the chapter. He is so confident that he is recommending an accelerated schedule which would have formal recruitment beginning in March or April of 2004.

Dear Tau Upsilon brothers of Phi Gamma Delta:

Last Saturday we held the first Fiji event at Tulane in several years. It was a remarkable success in that six graduate brothers were able to attend. Brian Pangburn was the first to arrive. He was followed by Kentucky graduate John Butler, Columbia graduate Kris Kaliebe, Tau Upsilon brother Greg Hackenberg, Purple Legionnaire Mike McLain, and Tau Upsilon brother Jeff Brennan. Several pictures have been posted o­n the Tulane Undergraduate site.

I would like to thank the many graduate brothers who were not able to attend. As far away as Spain (Luis Fernandez) or as close as Oklahoma (Mike Coats), Phi Gams heard the call and responded.

The reception was an opportunity to solidify the interest of several current students including a number of freshmen. The recolonization will work. All that we need is the support of the Tau Upsilon brothers. I encourage you to contact Josh Morita at the National Office and emphasize your support for the return of Phi Gamma Delta to the Tulane campus. I can’t imagine any Tulane Fiji not endorsing such an effort.

All that remains is national approval for a new colony. The students want it. You want it. The final key is your support. Imagine, finally being able to return to New Orleans for an October Pig Dinner. We need to see this through. Contact Josh Morita and the National Office at (859) 255-1848 or jmorita@phigam.org.

If you have any lingering doubts, I can forward you the email of interested students.

With all hopes of support,
Richard Clark

I'm please to let the Tulane FIJI alumni know that current Tulane students have taken the initiative and organized a graduate brother reception and mixed smoker. The event takes place on Saturday, September 27 at 4:00 PM at Audubon Park immediately opposite the Tulane campus. If you're unsure, there is a map posted on the undergraduate web site.

The intention of the students is to bring together Phi Gam alumni and students who want the Fiji to return to campus. By coming together, we hope to build support among the alumni for the recolonization. This support is the only thing lacking for final approval from the national office for the chapter to return to campus.

The second purpose of the event is to promote the fraternity among current undergraduates and familiarize them with Phi Gamma Delta. If you loved your days as a Phi Gam on campus, this is your chance to pass on the spirit of those feelings to current students.

Finally, you will have an opportunity to meet the current Director of Greek Life, Jacob Bolin as well as members of the IFC executive committee. In addition, there will be members of several sororities at the event. You will be able to see for yourself the positive changes on campus have made recolonization possible.

If you lived in Monroe Hall as a freshman (even if you didn't), you'll get a kick out of this recent image of Monroe Hall.

Richard Clark

The university administration has renewed the Phi Gam site o­n the Tulane server and given us access in order to promote the recolonization.

The old site remains online, but a new entry page has been set up to direct readers to letters of support from the university and affiliated organizations.  In addition, brief bios are being put o­nline of as many recruits as possible.  At the request of the national office, this group remains loosely affiliated until the appropriate time.  This will allow the national office to ensure the best candidates.

As we are in the middle of finals, I suspect the bios will slowly appear.  In addition, I am less than web savvy, and so Travis Powell, computer engineering major and ROTC candidate, is helping to put this together.

Richard Clark

Brothers’

To give you a bit more information on the re-colonization effort, and to answer a few questions that have arose since my email, I asked Richard Clark to summarize some of the reasons why a re-colonization effort at Tulane can work. In addition, some wanted a better understanding of what his motivations were for putting in the enormous effort of petitioning International, and organizing a group of interested men.

I think there have been some significant changes in the past few years, but, as many of you, I still have some concerns over the long-term prospects for Fiji and the greek system at Tulane as a whole. I will be looking into the situation further and will be filling you in on what I am able to find out.

The following was written by Richard in an email to me....

GJH

http://nola.com/sports/t-p/index.ssf?/base/sports-2/1050992740175600.xmlhttp://feedback.tulane.edu/

I have just upgraded this site to the latest version of PostNUKE complete with all of the latest security patches. Probably the best new feature is the WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) visual editor for submitting stories. Unfortunately, I think it o­nly works from Windows platforms. Still, very nice for submitting/editing content.

Also, I've removed the forums and chat features since no o­ne is really using them.

Got the following e-mail from headquarters this morning and thought I'd post it here...

There are numerous brothers who are actively serving our country in the military today overseas and at home. Each of us should offer our support and prayers for our brothers who may stand in harm’s way and wish them a quick and safe return.

To keep the Fraternity informed, we will post the names of brothers who are currently serving in the armed forces in the “News” section of www.phigam.org. If you know a brother who should be on this list, please contact Director of Communications Ed Gabe at egabe@phigam.org or at (859) 255-1848 ext. 121. Please supply the brother’s full name, school and class year if possible, as well as any information regarding his rank and the branch of the military in which he serves.

Perge!

TulaneFIJI.com will be down intermittently over the next few days as we move to a fancy new load-balanced server.

I may also upgrade the site during this time.

Thank you for your patience.

I just received the following update from Richard Clark on the recolonization effort. Click "Read more..." below to view the letter.

-Brian

I've just added a photo gallery system to the TulaneFIJI site. You can get to it by selecting the "Photo Gallery" link at the left.

I have added four albums ("Back in the day...", "Brothers in action", "Family/Personal", and "Other"). You can upload new pictures and create you own "nested albums" in order to group pictures (e.g. if you want to post family pictures, you should create your own nested album).

I've received two additional e-mails from Richard Clark, a Ph.D. student in History at Tulane, regarding his campaign to recolonize Tau Upsilon.

The first, sent to me on 2-9-2003, provides some background about Richard and his motivations for leading the recolonization campaign.

The second, sent to me on 2-4-2003, details some of the steps Richard has taken.

The letters follow below...

Well this is great news!

After 6 years away, I'm making it to mardi gras.

well i sent an email to everyone, so just drop me a note if your in town.

There is currently an effort underway to re-colonize Tulane. If anyone is interested please contact Richard Clark at dclark1@tulane.edu

Green Wave Downs Warriors To Win 2002 Hawaii Bowl. Read more here.

Congratulations to Brian and his wife on the birth of their daughter Natalie Ann born at 10:49pm on 11-23-2002. She was 8 pounds, 5 ounces and 20 1/2" long. A picture follows below.

Please ignore my previous posting of high hopes the Wave would finish in the top five of C-USA. I thought we were back in the Greg Davis era after giving Army win its first win of the season.

After another impressive win against Navy, Tulane is now bowl eligible. Liberty Bowl, GMAC Bowl, New Orleans Bowl, Houston Bowl or the Hawaii Bowl...who is in for a road trip this December? Roll Wave.

Village at N.E.R.D. has set us up with our own IRC Chat Channel. To chat with other brothers in real time, click the "Chat" link at the right or click here.

If you prefer a different chat client, the server is "irc.tulanefiji.com" and the channel is "#tfchat".

I mentioned to some of you that when I finished school, I'd re-do the site... well, here it is:

The new TulaneFIJI.com is a complete web portal complete with news, private messaging, and forums. You do have to create an account to do much with the site, but it is a pretty painless process.