State of the Association Address

Brothers, Family, and Friends, first and foremost I would like to thank you for attending this years Founders Day celebration, and for your continue support of our chapter. Specifically, I would like to thank the members of the Board of Trustees who are present, Nick Sivertsen our chairman, as always Kevin Petschow, and the members of my executive team, particularly our vice president Dan Manno, Justin Shook, who put this great event together, Tim Carstenson, and Glen Turner, our officers Derek Wilkinson and John Coyne, and also thank those members who could not be present, especially John Coyne who is preparing for his wedding at his pre-cana retreat this weekend, and Tyler Donahue, chairman of the Housing Corporation, who although I don’t want to jinx him, is at the hospital expecting a new “package” to be delivered. Our parents, especially my own parents and grandma who are here. And most of all, I want to thank the undergraduate chapter for being here. I cannot say it enough that everything we do we do for you guys. You have my utmost love and respect.

Over the past year, we have had the opportunity to share with each other some very special events in the lives of our members. Too often we think of our brotherhood by the activities we participate in together, but personally, sharing in those special moments in each others lives are what make us a brotherhood, and the Association’s most cherished “events.” Annie and Derek have been celebrating their continued engagement. John and Emily were engaged, as well as Nick and Katie, and Matt Dean and Lindesay. Steve “Cosmo” and Kerri’s wedding, I would also like to congratulate our alumni who are perusing higher education, including Ryan Nagele, Jon Hutti, Matt Feely, and Paul Sienna.

I’d like to make a special recognition tonight as well to the members of the 1984 pledge classes, who are celebrating their 25th anniversary this year of being an ATO. We are fortunate to have with us tonight Bill Toft and his wife. Today while exploring the boxes in the house, we ran across an article from the Daily Vidette published in 1985 about our chapter. If you will let me, I would like to read what the article said: (When I find the article again I will post it!) What is interesting in this article is that it could have been published in the Vidette today and still be as equally true. Our brotherhood is not something that changes over time, but rather, rings true for all of our members.

Before I go on, I have a confession to make – I haven’t really prepared any notes for tonight, so I’m going to wing this… but trust that I’ve been thinking about this for the last few months. Several weeks ago, one of our undergraduates asked us why we do what we do. Now I admit, it wasn’t brought up in that rhetorical tone, the chapter had been struggling with some issues, but nonetheless it is a question I would like to answer here tonight. We are blessed to be in a Christian Fraternity, so although we may not always talk about it in the terms I will use, I think it will speak much about it. Whether we call God Allah, or Yahweh, or Father, or even if we aren’t quite sure what to call Him, I think that everything that we do, we somehow do for Him. The Jesuit motto is “Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam”, which translated means “For the Greater Glory of God.” It tells us that everything we do in our lives, we want to do it to Glorify God somehow. And really, we find ourselves doing this all of the time. Whether we act as a good son, a good husband, a good parent, or a good brother, we may not know it, but we make this motto true. Tonight I’d like to put a twist on this for us, and make our motto “Ad Majorem Nostorum Fraternorum Gloriam” or “For the Greater Glory of our Brothers.” Imagine our brotherhood if every action we did, we did to bring honor and glory to our fraternity, and as a Christian fraternity, ultimately brought glory to God. Every time we help our brothers, be it by studying with them, supporting them with life issues, counseling them, and giving ourselves up to them, we bring Glory to our Fraternity and its efforts to “Bind men together in a brotherhood based upon eternal and immutable principals.” It’s simply about being a good brother, and the best ATO that we can be.

I would like to continue on to last year’s conversation we had at Founders Day. I was honored several months ago when Dan Brennan spoke of what we had talked about then, the difference between a dream and a vision: In one of Plato’s letters, he tells us to take that “waking vision,” and we are called to see to it that this vision becomes reality, to become a slave to that vision. To recap, whereas dreams are transient, visions are so true, so paliable that we can almost see them, touch them, and the last year has been about taking the Vision of our Fraternity and truly working together to make that into a reality. This past homecoming we were blessed to have a great turnout, bringing back many members from the 1990’s who hadn’t returned to our chapter since they had graduated. We have also been making progress on the construction of the “Scholarship Library,” converting the old storage room in the basement of the chapter house into a library, complete with computer workstations and class books. We are dedicated to the belief that no brother should not be able to succeed in school simply because he does not have the necessary recourses.If you haven’t done so already, please take a look at our Annual Appeal table to see the progress pictures and video, and consider making a financial contribution to this cause. To build on our conversation last year, I would like to move the Association forward into solidifying that vision. When I think of institutions, I think of organizations which have become a fixture in our society – places and people who we can always count on to be there for us. I want us to once again become an institution on this campus built on the foundation of our principals. I wish for others to see us as we truly are, so that tomorrow each of you will always have a home to return to at ISU.

That is why over the next year, the Association is going to take on several new initiatives. Job Board – It saddens me how many of our brothers have lost their jobs over the last year, and we need to help each other through this. First on my priority list is to establish a job board on our website so that alumni can post job openings at their companies, share their resumes, and help each other get to where they need to be. But this has so much greater potential than just this – I would like to one day have our fields listed so that our undergraduate brothers know who they could talk to about their course of study, and even help them find internships and jobs once they graduate. I truly feel that the opportunities for this are endless.

 Alumni Big Brothers- We want to pair up each active with a big brother mentor who is an alumni, to provide support for our younger brothers while they are in college. My hope is all of our brothers will see each other as brothers, regardless of where we are in life. From an Association perspective, I want our brothers to see themselves in their older brothers, so that they don’t think of their time in ATO as a four year commitment, but a lifelong commitment, ultimately enabling them to become better alumni once they graduate.

 Parents – we want to continue to support our parents and engage them with our younger and older brothers. We need our alumni to remain active with the undergraduate chapter so that parents will continue to support their sons involvement in our fraternity and challenge them to become better brothers.

Work Weekend – I would like to set a date at the beginning of summer to invite all of our alumni down to help prepare for our 35th anniversary next year. The house is in need of some work and I cannot think of a better way to fix it than have undergraduates and alumni side by side. My hope is that once alumni see what needs to be done, they will continue to travel down to ISU through the summer and see to it that their vision becomes reality.

Over the next year, this administration is going to work towards institutionalizing our chapter so that it will be a home for all of us in years to come. I would like to charge all of you here with the responsibility that you have taken to truly work together to build up our chapter. Please let me know how I can best continue to serve you. On behalf of all of our alumni, I thank you for attending this year’s founders day, and I look forward to serving you over the next year. Thank you.