[6787] in APO-L
Thoughts on the Service Hour Requirement
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Dale I. Newfield)
Wed Sep 22 23:03:08 1993
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 1993 23:01:17 -0400
Reply-To: "Dale I. Newfield" <dn1l+@andrew.cmu.edu>
From: "Dale I. Newfield" <dn1l+@andrew.cmu.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list APO-L <APO-L%PURCCVM.BITNET@mitvma.mit.edu>
I wrote this to Kappa Chapter. I had spent a year at another chapter:
Psi Omega, and had just returned to this school (where I pledged.)
I ask that you read this article through to the end. Do not try to
prove me wrong, or argue a point counter to this article until you have
completely finished reading it. I am going to explain, hopefully in an
objective fashion, factors that are keeping me from becoming an active
Brother in this chapter. I hope that at least some of you will take
some of these ideas to heart. I am also going to ask you as a chapter
to adopt a couple of these ideas. I thank you, in advance, for
listening, and thinking before reacting to all I have to say.
When I pledged this Fraternity, there was a discussion about the
quality of this chapter. Setting a service hour requirement was one of
the suggestions. At that time, I decided, and told people that if a
service hour requirement for Brothers were enacted, I would not initiate
Kappa Chapter of Alpha Phi Omega. Nothing came of the suggestion.
When I was initiated, I promised myself that I would never be an active
part of a chapter of Alpha Phi Omega that did not trust its Brotherhood.
I promised myself that I would never be a part of a chapter that had a
service hour requirement for Brothers.
When a person initiates as a Brother of Alpha Phi Omega, that person
has earned a certain amount of trust. The Brothers of A Phi O have
said, by extending an invitation to initiate: "We believe that your
ideals and values coincide with that of Alpha Phi Omega. We wish to
call you our Brother. We trust you to live up to this standard." This
trust means NOT that the Brothers SHOULD trust that new Brother to do
whatever he or she can to further the three Cardinal Principles, and to
do whatever service that he or she can, but that they DO trust that
Brother to do these things.
A Brother knows that he or she has that trust, but when a chapter says
to him or her "we don't think that you believe in service enough for us
unless you do what we say you should do," that trust has been violated.
The number of hours of service per semester is completely irrelevant,
when the chapter mandates ten minutes of service per semester, it is
just as bad as when they mandate one hundred hours of service per
semester.
There are other reasons that we have this requirement. One of the main
reasons is that we have a service hour requirement for our pledges. We
all know that fulfilling those requirements is not what causes someone
to receive an invitation to initiate Alpha Phi Omega. If this were the
case, one would simply stay a pledge until the checklist of requirements
are met, and then become a Brother. The time when Kappa votes to extend
an invitation for initiation is when each Brother of Kappa stands up and
either says "I trust this person, and wish to call him or her my
Brother," or "I don't believe that this person lives up to what I see as
Alpha Phi Omega's standards." (A vote that is sometimes more
appropriate is an abstention; please do not hesitate to abstain, if you
feel that you did not do enough to learn enough about a pledge to make
this important decision.) The number of hours that a person has
completed, and all of the other pledge requirements factor into this
decision, but I hope they do not dictate its outcome. I hope that there
is a more holistic insight into the character of each pledge that is
used by each Brother to make this important decision.
The mere fact that we have pledge requirements is almost misleading to
the pledges in and of itself. A pledge may believe that fulfilling the
requirements is all that is required to become a Brother. If instead of
these requirements, we instantiate a subjective pledge program, the
experience for the pledges can be much less ambiguous and more
enjoyable. Each pledge should be told that each Brother will have one
vote to cast when initiation invitations are being extended. They
should be told that during that time each Brother has a chance to decide
whether or not they wish to call him or her a Brother. A pledge should
be told that it is up to him or her to convince each Brother that they
would want to make this decision. They should be told that getting
service hours, et cetera are things that Brothers will look for while
making this decision, and they should strive to be a good pledge,
whatever that means to the pledge. (Just what a pledge considers a good
pledge is also an important insight into their character.) Most
importantly, each pledge should understand that it is up to them to
meet, and convince each Brother that they stand for the same things that
A Phi O stands for. Each vote by each Brother is a personal one, and
the pledges should know this.
If this is to work, Kappa would have to put faith into its Brotherhood.
Kappa must be able to trust Brothers that have not been around enough
to meet the pledges to abstain from the voting process. Kappa must also
be able to trust each of its Brothers to make the choice that they feel
is right, and not turn this important decision into a popularity contest.
I will not become an active Brother of Kappa while there is a service
hour requirement in effect. Please do not think of this as an
ultimatum. It is merely a fact. While attending the University of
Central Florida, where the Psi Omega Chapter of A Phi O is currently
active, I went through this same discussion with many of their Brothers.
In action, I was much more active than many of their Brothers, but I
never officially became a Brother of Psi Omega Chapter. I am still your
Brother. I am still your friend. I am still going to be around for the
service, and I still want all of you to feel that you can turn to me
whenever you might need or want to. I have a huge shoulder to cry on; I
make a good punching bag when you just want to kill someone, and I will
not violate any trust you put in me. You have my vow.
With Love and Respect for all my Brothers,
Dale Ian Newfield
