044 WELCOME TO THE NEIGHBORHOOD, PI KAPPA PHI!

MTSU Fraternity Brothers Put Sweat and Muscle into New Home

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Aug. 30, 2006
EDITORIAL CONTACT: Gina Logue, 615-898-5081

(MURFREESBORO) –After some seven years as an Interfraternity Council organization without an official brick-and-mortar home, Pi Kappa Phi has moved to Greek Row, the contemporary housing for MTSU fraternities and sororities on Rutherford Boulevard.
The national Pi Kappa Phi was founded in 1904 at the College of Charleston in Charleston, S.C. According to the group’s Web site, it boasts 126 active chapters and 11 associate chapters, more than 91 alumni chapters and more than 95,000 initiated brothers.
“They’re consistently number one or number two among all MTSU fraternities in terms of grades,” Gentry McCreary, director of Greek Life, says of the MTSU chapter.
McCreary adds that the Pi Kapps meet all qualifications, including support from the national organization and local alumni, chapter size, and the ability to fill or almost fill the house. Local brothers estimate this semester’s pre-rush total of brothers to be between 20 and 25.
A committee made up of representatives from the Division of Business and Finance, the Division of Student Affairs, the Office of University Counsel and other university officials reviewed requests to fill the space vacated when Kappa Sigma’s national chapter revoked the local chapter’s charter in January 2006.
“We were looking for chapter performance in terms of community service, GPA (grade point average), leadership, things like that,” McCreary says.
McCreary says the Pi Kapps have signed a one-year lease with an option to renew for a second year. While no extensive modifications will be made to the exterior of the house immediately, banners are being provided to cover stonework.
The Pi Kapps have spent the last several weeks painting and overseeing minor repairs to the house such as replacing locks and some minor plumbing. James David, the local chapter’s treasurer, says he’s excited about the move.
“It just means, hopefully, that we’ll be able to grow, and we’ll have a central meeting place where we can all go,” David, a junior from Franklin, says.
House Manager Jimmy Miller, a sophomore from Phoenix, Ariz., also is looking forward to the Greek Row experience.
“It will just be a lot of fun to live with the brothers and establish relationships with other fraternities,” Miller says.
The national service association with which the Pi Kapps are affiliated is Push America, a group whose purpose is to raise awareness of people with disabilities and to help improve their quality of life. Each spring, the fraternity teams with a sorority to conduct an “empathy dinner” during which able-bodied students must eat blindfolded, with one arm behind the back or with a similar impediment.
Another Pi Kappa Phi service project is Push America’s annual Bike Across America. The annual cycling excursion raises money for people with disabilities. The cycling team stayed with the local Pi Kapps during their stopover in Murfreesboro last year.

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