Citizenship and Collaboration

Citizenship: active community participation as a result of a sense of responsibility to the communities in which people live. After discussing citizenship this week in class I have come to the conclusion that one can be a part of a community without actually being an active citizen of that community. I think with Greek Life in particular there are the active citizens on every chapter who help out whenever needed and then there are just the chapter members who just sit by and watch what goes on but do not get actively involved. I would say Delta Zeta's view citizenship as working to give back to the communities which they are a part of. This takes time working together and realizing what Delta Zeta's vision is so we are all on the same page. I know one area of citizenship that our chapter excells at is service. Whenever there is a service project multiple girls always sign up and are excited to give back. They enjoy doing service because they see how it benefits other people. Another idea we talked about in class is social capital, and how a communities success are more likely if the citizens are actively engaged with each other. I know in Delta Zeta we try to attend everyone's philanthropy events and if not we at least try to give a donation because this helps us become more actively engaged with other chapters on campus spreading the word about Delta Zeta and gives us a better chance of success within the community.
Shifting from citizenship to collaboration, I view collaboration as a group of people working together toward a common goal. Something I loved that was discussed in this chapter is that collaboration tries to achieve mutual goals while cooperation is based on helping each party acheive its own goals. I think people get collaboration and cooperation confused all the time. I like to think of collaboration as a win win situation. You sit down with your group and discuss everything each person wants and come up with a solution that does not compromise anyones ideas but collaborates them all into one idea. Collaboration deals a lot with trusting one another, something that takes a while to be built up but can be lost in a instant. In order for people to trust me I pride myself on keeping things private that need to be kept private. If someone comes to me with a concern I will not go tell another sister because then the person who came and told me would lose trust in me. Another way to build trust is to trust other people. I know as president that I cannot do everything and sharing ownership is a big part of building trust. When you trust other people with specific leadership roles or leaderless groups they will in return trust you and what you are doing. We also try to create powerful compelling experiences to help build trust. I know when I was a sophomore we had a chapter retreat and went on a scavenger hunt around campus. I had never felt so closer to my sisters until that point because we all worked together and trusted each other to get the scavenger hunt done, it was a great experience.

We cannot wait for Change

President Barack Obama once said "Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek" I think alot of times people get caught up in the fact that change will eventually happen and forget that if they want something changed themselves they need to go out and do it. After reading the chapter on citizenship it is a lot about being an active part in something bigger than yourself and that is what we strive for as sorority women and fraternity men. When you are a part of something bigger than yourself you have to contribute as a citizen and make change.
An individual can do something to create change which can then cause a chain reaction that will eventually contribute to the whole group and get everyone on board. Right now our new member educator wants to changed the new members meetings from Sunday nights to Monday night. this change of dates would be viewed as a single order change. Her reasoning for this is that sunday is used to catch up on homework and many people have other things going on. At the same time Monday is chapter day so new members would be encouraged to come to formal dinner and their meetings would be right after formal dinner creating a meeting environment that is formal much like chapter. Allowing the new members to get in the habit of wearing business attire to dinner and their meetings on Monday to get ready for chapter. personally I feel like this is a great idea but some other members of the chapter do not agree. I think this could eventually turn into second order change, changing the organization fundamental values and assumptions. By making the new member meetings on Monday we place more emphasis on our value of professionalism. Because I know when I was a new member our meetings were on Sunday and I never showed up in chapter attire it was always sweatpants or leggings and a T-shirt. By having the meetings on Monday we can create second order change and get the new members to value the professionalism aspect of being in a sorority and how that can help them in the future. In conclusion, on individual can start change but when they get the rest of the group to support them there is no stopping their idea of change.
Another aspect of change that I think is sometimes forgotten in the Greek community is how powerful the greek community is. In the chapter on citizenship, working together was discussed and how members must identify in some way with the community but not necessarily in the same way. Our similar identification as a member of the greek community can be used to create citizenship by doing greek wide community service events, doing community research, getting politically involved, or being socially responsible. If we as a community take action against something we are passionate about it could be very successful because we are such a large community.

My Development as a Leader

As I have just started by term as president of Delta Zeta sorority at The Ohio State University I can see how my views on social change are different than they used to be.  I am the kind of person who believes in leading by example. As president I am someone the whole chapter looks to for guidance and support, If I am not being the best I can be and leading by example then the whole chapter will suffer. Before becoming president I did not view social change as such a hard concept for people to understand. Constantly there are issues people want resolved. A problem I have been having in our chapter is people do not deal well with change and when someone wants to change something for the better, not everyone will agree. With that if the change is for the better you cannot always please everyone you just have to do what is best for the group as a whole. In chapter four it states "It is about creating values-based umbrella large enough to accommodate the various interests of followers, but focused enough to direct all their energies in pursuit of a common good(105)". This is something that we try to strive for in our chapter but sometimes it gets hard. We are so diverse everyone wants something different and it is hard to please everyone. That is why we have developed many leadership positions and policies that accommodate almost everyone like the umbrella in the above quote. 

When I was younger I used to view social change as one person changing things for the better but during my time in Delta Zeta I have found much more gets done when there is a collaborative environment. "When leadership is not done in secret and imposed upon followers but is a collaborative and empowering process between leaders and followers, the organization can accomplish more than ever thought possible (106)." Without the help of chapter members, chair positions, and executive officers I would not be able to do what I do. I get so much accomplished with the help of everyone else around me in Delta Zeta. When one person has an idea and shares it with everyone else whether it be a normal chapter member or a chair position we all listen to their idea, suggest other options and come up with a plan to implement it. Showing that with collaboration much more can be accomplished. I know I would be lost without my executive board standing with me helping us accomplish more and more everyday.

I have also come to see that social change can take a very long time but if you do something each day for the better change will eventually come. I am not the kind of person who is very patient but since I have taken this position I have learned that I need to be patient and work with people in order to get things done. Along those same lines the book brought up a great point about maintaining the change that has been made and avoid slipping back into old habits. For example we just got new furniture on our first floor (formal and informal room) and there is no eating or napping on these couches. This is a very big change because before we had old couches in the informal room so people used to eat and nap in the informal room all the time. Because of this we need to maintain the change by reinforcing people not eating/napping in the informal room and speaking to people who do so the change can be for the better making both rooms look nice for years to come. This goes back to leading by example, if an exec member decides they are going to eat their takeout in front of the tv in the informal room on the furniture then everyone else will think it is okay, when it really is not. I know that since my term as president is just beginning through the obstacles I face i will develop new view on social change and will continue to learn to approach things differently. You learn more as you go and I am sure over the next year I am going to learn so much about leadership and the right way to lead a group of people and effectively making social change for the better.