This summer Brother Jordan Roses ’16 has been working as an advisory intern at KPMG, one of the big 4 accounting firms. He works with financial analysts to create reports and forecasts for the business. Jordan is tasked with evaluating the company’s financial statements to hedge risk and help the company meet its business goals.

Jordan is pursuing a double major in mathematics and economics and has found that much of what he has learned at Lafayette can be applied to his work at KPMG. Additionally, Jordan serves as DKE’s recruitment chair.

This summer Brother Tory Bingaman ’16 is interning for T&M Associates, an engineering consulting firm at their offices in Plymouth Meeting, PA and Bethlehem, PA. The civil engineering major has worked with their real estate development group which plans for construction jobs by performing calculations for storm and sanitary water management. The development group uses different computer programs to create designs for the project.

Bingaman has worked with other engineers at the company on various projects by editing drafts of designs and confirming that ordinances and building codes were met before the projects moved on for final approvals. In addition, Bingaman has been able to see the communication required between the engineers, the townships, and the owners that must occur while planning a project. In the fall, Bingaman will begin his second semester as the vice president for DKE.

This summer Brother Michael Goldman ’16 has interned with GE Capital’s risk management team in Stamford, CT. More specifically, Goldman has worked with the credit risk team at the branch. Goldman has overlooked European, African, and Asian portfolios, and has worked on a project on investment banks and regional banks.

Goldman has spent his time at GE performing daily limit checks looking for breaches and excesses. He has also reviewed and revised calculated ratings for a variety of entities. As an economics major, Goldman will pursue a career in finance after graduating from Lafayette.

This past Saturday the Brothers of the Rho chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon participated in Lafayette’s National Day of Service known as Lafapalooza through the Landis Community Outreach Center.  The brotherhood was stationed at the Easton Urban Farm in downtown Easton, PA to help prepare for the new growing season.

The farm’s harvests are donated yearly to Easton Area Neighborhood Center’s food bank and senior citizen housing centers.

The brothers spent the day weeding, mulching, and preparing new tomato beds for the farm. The day’s efforts were an excellent opportunity to reach out to the community and offer a helping hand to an organization that benefits hundreds of people in Easton.

We would like to thank everyone at Landis and the Easton Urban Farm for allowing us access to the farm to provide service for the community. We would also like to thank Director of Service and Philanthropy Brother Sam Todd ’15 for coordinating DKE’s involvement in the event.

This past Tuesday five brothers from the Rho chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon presented their yearly Accreditation Presentation in Oeschle 224 at Lafayette College.

As former and current executive position holders in the fraternity, Brothers Michael Kelley ’14, Billy Leonard ’14, Brett Lederer ’15, Wiley Houldin ’15, and Kevin Fasano ’15 were responsible for presenting the Powerpoint to various school administrators and students.

As academics remain the first priority for the fraternity today, Treasurer Kevin Fasano spoke about the chapter’s mandatory study halls for brothers struggling academically under the supervision of faculty advisor Professor Richard Shupp. By implementing these study hours, we hope to foster better study habits that will translate to better results in the classroom in the coming semesters.

The presentation highlighted brothers’ involvement and leadership in activities around campus including but not limited to varsity tennis, swimming, and soccer, staff writers and editors for “The Lafayette,” Tau Beta Pi, Alumni Relations Council, Common Sense Action, and Lafayette College Ambassador Program.

Also discussed were the chapter’s service and philanthropy events, including this year’s Jeremy Saxe Memorial Basketball Tournament and days spent working at the Lafayette Farm as part of our attempt to have a stronger community influence.

All in all, the presentation was an amazing opportunity to highlight all the amazing things we do on and off campus to school administrators and our fellow students. We would like to thank Grace Reynolds (Director of Residence Life), Paul McLaughlin (Dean of Students), Annette Diorio (Vice President for Campus Life), Connor Heinlein (President of Student Government), and Ryan Monahan (VP of Student Government) for providing us the opportunity to speak and for taking the time to listen to the progress we have made as a chapter.

Last Saturday, the brothers of the Rho Chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon hosted the 6th Annual Jeremy Saxe Memorial Basketball Tournament in the Kamine Gym. This charity event is held every year to honor the life of Brother Jeremy Saxe, who passed away during his senior year due to an undiagnosed heart condition. The proceeds from the event are donated to the Jeremy Saxe foundation to help build schools in Nepal.

The tournament is held in a 3 vs 3 format, as organized teams had the option to compete in either the competitive or non-competitive bracket. All were welcome to participate, as Lafayette students from all class years came to compete, as well as multiple DKE alumni. Even a team from Easton High School came out to support Jeremy’s cause. All in all it was a fun-filled, productive day at Lafayette, as DKE raised about $8,200 in donations, making this year’s tournament the highest grossing tournament to date.

After dozens of match ups took place on four different courts in the Kamine Gym, a team of four seniors (three of which are DKE brothers) came out on top. Brandon Turner, along with Brothers Rob Howe ’14, Michael Kelley ’14, and Charles Roberts ’14 (pictured below) calling themselves “The Fab Four” took home the trophy in the competitive bracket.

DKE would like to send a heartfelt thank you to everyone who showed up to participate and to those who worked to make this event possible. We would also like to send a special thanks to Brother Chris McConnell ’09 for his help organizing the tournament. And finally we would like to thank all of the DKE alumni who were not able to make it to the event but still chose to donate to Jeremy’s foundation. With everyone’s continued support we hope to have an even larger turnout for next year’s tournament.

Here is the link to the photo album from this year’s tournament courtesy of the Saxe family:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/100722331775041728062/albums/6002618193009277377

On Thursday April 10th, the Brothers of the Rho chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon hosted their annual Faculty Reception at the DKE house. Dozens of professors, administrators, and faculty members alike came out to enjoy hors d’oeuvres and the company of their favorite DKE students. The goal of the event is to build a relationship between the faculty and the Greek community in a location other than a classroom setting.

The faculty reception gave brothers an opportunity to exhibit their “Jolly Good Fellow” side, as well as their “Gentleman” side, as opposed to the scholarly attitude professors have become accustomed to from DKE brothers in the classroom.

Bon Appetít provided catering for the event, as brothers and faculty alike were able to mingle throughout the three hour reception. Conversations ranged from declaring majors, to the advantages of joining Greek Life, to the recent start of The Masters golf tournament, which played on the TV throughout the event.

The event was a big success, and we would like to thank all who took the time out of their schedules to attend. This is an event that we look forward to each year, and we hope to have an even bigger turnout for next year’s event in light of our 160th Anniversary celebration.

 

This past Sunday, three brothers helped the Alumni Relations Council host the third annual Dine 3/9 event at Pfenning Alumni Center. Dine 3/9 is an event that is held to commemorate the establishment of Lafayette College.

On March 9, 1826 the Senate of the House of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania granted the charter to establish Lafayette College. Students and alumni alike get together to join in the celebration for food, refreshments, and cheers to all that have walked through the gates of Lafayette College.

This year the event doubled its turn out from last year.

As members of the Alumni Relations Council, brothers Bakari Boone ’15, Wiley Houldin ’15, and Michael Goldman ’16 helped set up and plan the event.

“Being a member of the Alumni Relations Council makes the event more special,” Goldman said. “Our organization puts in the dirty work in making this event enjoyable.”

Thank you to everyone who came out to celebrate the college, and we look forward to seeing you next year.

 

For a week during the winter break, brother Michael Goldman ’16 participated in an externship with Macquarie Group in Manhattan.

Macquarie is a global investment bank founded in Australia in 1969. They are the largest infrastructure investor in the world and help corporations and wealthy investors. Goldman shadowed Jim Hummerstone ’86, a former student athlete and Greek organization member at Lafayette.

During the externship, Goldman had the opportunity to meet with a variety of people at the company to get a hands on experience of how the business is run. Goldman also traveled to the Bloomberg headquarters where he was given an inside look at the company’s operations through a detailed tour.

Following the conclusion of the externship, Goldman attended the Lafayette Networking Night in New York to reconnect with his host and share his experiences with other Lafayette students and alumni.

As an economics major, Goldman plans to use his externship experience to help assert himself in the financial world, with an end goal of landing a job on Wall Street.

Over the winter break, the Rho chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon sent two of its members to Futures Quest, a leadership and team building workshop in Indiana. Here is chapter president Brett Lederer’s reflection:

 

“Flying out to Indianapolis on a crisp January morning, I had no idea what I was getting myself into.  I was about to fly into a place on the verge of being hit with a historic snowstorm and low temperatures that I had never thought possible.  I didn’t know what to expect and the impact this conference would have on my fraternity and myself as a leader.  However, by the time the weekend had ended and I graduated the program, I gained an invaluable experience that I will carry with me throughout my time at Lafayette and the rest of my life.

One of the main lessons the mentors of Futures Quest instilled into us is the importance of our rituals.  They stressed the idea that rituals are not just practices we do in secret a couple of times each year.  They are values that our fraternity was founded on.  We need to live our rituals every single day as fraternity men.  The mentors challenged us to think back to what our founding fathers built the organization on.  Without these rituals, we would be just a social group rather than a strong fraternity.

We were also challenged to look inward to ourselves as leaders.  By creating lists of our values and taking part in various activities such as trust falls, we were asked to decide what kind of leaders we would be.  On the first night, the group watched the movie ’12 Angry Men’.  The lesson from the film was that it’s important to stand up for what you believe in.  Regardless of what the majority says, it is pivotal for a fraternity to make decisions based only on its values.

The following day, the snow began to fall and did so all day and throughout the night.  Many of the activities that were supposed to be done outside had to be either cancelled or moved indoors. Despite these conditions, we turned them into challenges that we overcame.  We learned that being a leader started with trusting the people around you.  We learned this through climbing a huge rock wall while blindfolded.  Despite not being able to see what was ahead, the climber knew that the people down below were walking him through it each step of the way.  This taught us that although we don’t know what lies ahead, we know that we are part of a brotherhood that supports us.

This ties into another value that the mentors of Futures Quest emphasized to us.  They told us to look around and realize that despite the fact that we all came from different fraternities, we were all the same.  Greek Life as a whole is a brotherhood.  With only four fraternities left on campus, this idea could not be more important at Lafayette.

As a leader of my fraternity and a member of Lafayette’s Greek Life I know that we are currently trying to improve our standards on campus.  After taking part in Futures Quest, I believe that I can take what I learned and bring that back to better our Greek community.  If we stick to our values and trust in the people around us, then we will continue to flourish as leaders on campus.  I want to thank Jon Williamson and the rest of the Futures Quest staff for the incredible experience they afforded me.”

 

Here is brother Kevin McAndrew’s reflection on his experience at Futures Quest:

 

“The John Williamson Futures Quest was quite an experience.  Located at Camp Tecumseh, about 70 miles outside of the city of Indianapolis, this program does its best to create an isolated space clear of distractions, generating a fantastic environment for personal reflection.  Each day, the team building activities and group discussions that I participated in taught me lessons that I feel improved my leadership ability and could improve the entire Rho Chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon as well.  With representatives from many different fraternities across the country, I received a diverse education.  Though geographically disconnected, we saw the common fraternal values we shared and ended up becoming very close by the end of the program.

Futures Quest began with some icebreakers, making everyone a little more comfortable with each other.  Then things jumped immediately into team challenges.  These activities required every member to execute their part or else the entire team effort would go to waste.  Though at the time I did not realize it, each team activity directly correlated to a fraternity.  Like a fraternity, these teambuilding games required good communication, encouragement, and vision.  In order to achieve the goal, the entire group needed to be involved and fully aware of what we were trying to accomplish.  At Lafayette, the goals we set as a chapter require the same traits.  With strong leadership and every brother giving his best effort, I have no doubt that we will make the changes that will lead to the overall chapter improvement that we want to see in the future.

Later that day, we discussed strategies for becoming a better leader and standing up for what you believe in.  As a leader, you need to stand strong by your beliefs; however, you also need to accept the opinions of those around you if they are different than yours.  Many times when someone takes on a leadership role, they are overbearing.   They have devised their own plan and expect the scheme to be carried out exactly in the image that they have imagined.  That should not be the case.  Anytime a group gets together, each member needs to have their input heard.  It is very common for someone to be too afraid to give their opinion if that means they are going to be the only one in the group to object to something that has already been decided.  Sometimes that one person’s outlook could be the difference between a project’s success and failure.

By the end of this program, I am confident that I became a better leader and can bring some new ideas to improve my chapter and the Greek community.  Futures Quest made me think differently.  For years I had the same leadership strategies; but after graduating from this program, the flaws and strengths of my beliefs were exposed.  In anything we do, teamwork is key.  At Lafayette, every Greek organization can benefit from each other if we work together as a team.”