Relay For Life Greek Recruitment Co-Chair Reflection
Relay For Life is an amazing organization the helps many people and their families through difficult situations. Our campus is lucky enough to host one of the largest Relays in the country. The support of the University of Cincinnati student body, faculty, staff, and our community is incredible. Despite the fact that Relay For Life is a one weekend event, the planning and efforts of the committee are part of a year-round process. The planning and service of the committee and participants of Relay For Life and the American Cancer Society begins at the beginning of the school year and continues to the very end. Many of the committee members also work over the summer with preliminary planning and working with our advisors.
Relay For Life holds a special place in my heart. My dad had colon cancer for five and a half years. During that time, he and my mom would travel to Cleveland several times for surgeries and doctor’s appointments. Relay For Life sponsors another asset of the American Cancer Society, the Hope Lodge. Cancer patients and their families are able to stay in the Hope Lodge for free, which is an incredible blessing after all of the bills from the hospital.
For some reason, I never got involved in Relay For Life until I came to college. When I got to campus freshmen year, I wanted to find ways to get involved and most importantly, get community service hours. Relay For Life seemed like as good an organization as any to get involved with. I had a motivation and a history with what they fought for, so I figured why not. I had recently joined my fraternity, Sigma Phi Epsilon, and wanted to get involved in Greek Life. I applied to be the Relay For Life Greek Recruitment Chair to fulfill both of my desires and was selected.
I admit that it was a bit intimidating working with people in the Greek community across campus. My position on the committee required me to talk with just about all of the chapter presidents and philanthropy chairs. It was a bit weird for me because I didn’t really have any standing within the Greek community (not that I really do now). Luckily, I had a co-chair to split the responsibilities with. We spent a lot of time emailing and calling members in other Greek organizations and trying to get our own fraternity and sorority to sign up.
Something that took me a while to realize is that the Greek community is incredibly busy with philanthropy and individual chapter events. The school year is dealt with on a week by week basis with each chapter desperately trying to get its members to sacrifice several hours per week to events at which their chapter should be present. I now know from experience exactly how difficult it is for the executive board and the membership to sacrifice such a large amount of time and focus on schoolwork. Being in a fraternity is not easy work.
We hosted a Greek recruitment night in Stratford Heights pavilion which is right in the middle of most of the Greek housing. Our turn out was abysmal. Very few chapters were represented, and the chapters that showed up were mostly sororities. It was a bad sign for the weeks to come. We only had two months until Relay occurred and had only four or five Greek organizations signed up. My co-chair and I bombarded the executive boards with emails asking them to sign up and begin fundraising. Some chapters responded very well, and others did not respond at all. As a freshmen (who had never attended a Relay For Life before), I was asked to come and talk about the event at chapter houses to promote the event within their chapters. Luckily, my friend Michelle (a fourth year at the time), tagged along with me. She was clearly the more experienced of the two of us, and I was able to learn a lot from her about how to promote our event.
We did our best as Greek Recruitment Chairs to stay in constant communication with the organizations we were trying to encourage. We wanted to continually remind them the event was coming up and that they needed to be prepared for it. We helped groups plan their onsite fundraisers. We helped people learn how to sign up online for the event. We even helped a few people with their online payments. I now saw why Relay For Life needed chairs specifically for Greek Life.
As a result of our efforts, the Greek participation actually increased by 25% from the previous year’s involvement. The fundraising had also increased, and I think that many of the people I spoke with on a regular basis attended and had a lot of fun. Once we made it to the event, my job was technically over, but I helped set up and take care of day of issues. I also stayed to clean up after Relay had ended. It was incredible how many people could fit on McMicken Commons. Many of the Greek organizations had their onsite fundraisers that I helped them establish. It was really cool to see the fruits of my labor out on the Commons.
Since my freshmen year, I have continued to be involved with Relay For Life as the Greek Recruitment Chair. I set up a mailing list of the chapter presidents and the contacts for each chapter. The contact for each chapter changes every year, but the previous year’s contact will provide me with a new point of contact within their chapter. I’m sure it is annoying to them, but one email to provide a good communication basis for Relay is not a big deal.
I have also expanded my presence and responsibilities within our organization. It was establish early (earlier than I would like to admit) that I am one of those people who gets excited and obnoxious as peoples spirits start to dwindle throughout the night. When people on our committee get tired, I am there to scream in their faces and wake them up. This year, I told jokes in the middle of the night just to keep the people at Relay entertained. I like to make a fool out of myself if it helps the people around me get through whatever challenge we are facing.
For the past two years, I was the unofficially the official photographer for Relay For Life. Using my camera, I would go around and take pictures of people’s onsite fundraisers, special events taking place at Relay, and just general goings on. Each year I have taken approximately 400-500 photos. This year, I was able to post them on my Google account for others to access. The News Record even used many of my pictures in their article on Relay For Life at UC hitting $1,000,000 fundraised since it began on our campus.
This past year (2012), I took it upon myself to be the motivational DJ in the late hours of the morning as Relay was wrapping up. I played songs that most people know the dances to. We had about 40-50 people out in front of TUC dancing and making fools of themselves. UC happened to be having an open house for prospective students that day, and I’m sure we left a memorable impression for all of them. My time as the DJ was aptly named “Nate Bodenschatz’s DJ Power Hour”. People enjoyed it so much that they asked for a second one. During the second hour, I led our clean-up efforts while we all sang and danced. So many people were invigorated that it took us much less time to clean up than usual, and we were able to enjoy the last half hour of the event without anything else to worry about. It was incredible.
I hope that I was able to help and inspire people at Relay and on our committee. I never had the most important job for our organization, but I wanted to help as much as possible in the best ways I knew how. I used my strengths to add value and character to the event. Unfortunately, I will be out of the country next year during Relay, but I am hoping to be with everyone in spirit. Perhaps I will make mix CDs to continue the tradition of the Nate Bodenschatz DJ Power Hour.
My efforts to be positive and keep up my energy when everyone else was crashing helped prolong the life of the event. I like to think that without me, everyone would have been drudging along; not wanting to help clean up. With our dance marathon, we brought back the energy and excitement to Relay. It was the perfect way to close out the event.
Hopefully those people will remember the fun times we had at the end of Relay and come back next year. With more people spreading the word of how enjoyable Relay For Life is, our attendance will increase. With increased attendance, we will have increased fundraising. Increased fundraising will lead to an increase in the number of lives we can help and save, and that’s really what it’s all about: giving back to an organization that helped my family so that it can continue to help families across the country.
Relay For Life holds a special place in my heart. My dad had colon cancer for five and a half years. During that time, he and my mom would travel to Cleveland several times for surgeries and doctor’s appointments. Relay For Life sponsors another asset of the American Cancer Society, the Hope Lodge. Cancer patients and their families are able to stay in the Hope Lodge for free, which is an incredible blessing after all of the bills from the hospital.
For some reason, I never got involved in Relay For Life until I came to college. When I got to campus freshmen year, I wanted to find ways to get involved and most importantly, get community service hours. Relay For Life seemed like as good an organization as any to get involved with. I had a motivation and a history with what they fought for, so I figured why not. I had recently joined my fraternity, Sigma Phi Epsilon, and wanted to get involved in Greek Life. I applied to be the Relay For Life Greek Recruitment Chair to fulfill both of my desires and was selected.
I admit that it was a bit intimidating working with people in the Greek community across campus. My position on the committee required me to talk with just about all of the chapter presidents and philanthropy chairs. It was a bit weird for me because I didn’t really have any standing within the Greek community (not that I really do now). Luckily, I had a co-chair to split the responsibilities with. We spent a lot of time emailing and calling members in other Greek organizations and trying to get our own fraternity and sorority to sign up.
Something that took me a while to realize is that the Greek community is incredibly busy with philanthropy and individual chapter events. The school year is dealt with on a week by week basis with each chapter desperately trying to get its members to sacrifice several hours per week to events at which their chapter should be present. I now know from experience exactly how difficult it is for the executive board and the membership to sacrifice such a large amount of time and focus on schoolwork. Being in a fraternity is not easy work.
We hosted a Greek recruitment night in Stratford Heights pavilion which is right in the middle of most of the Greek housing. Our turn out was abysmal. Very few chapters were represented, and the chapters that showed up were mostly sororities. It was a bad sign for the weeks to come. We only had two months until Relay occurred and had only four or five Greek organizations signed up. My co-chair and I bombarded the executive boards with emails asking them to sign up and begin fundraising. Some chapters responded very well, and others did not respond at all. As a freshmen (who had never attended a Relay For Life before), I was asked to come and talk about the event at chapter houses to promote the event within their chapters. Luckily, my friend Michelle (a fourth year at the time), tagged along with me. She was clearly the more experienced of the two of us, and I was able to learn a lot from her about how to promote our event.
We did our best as Greek Recruitment Chairs to stay in constant communication with the organizations we were trying to encourage. We wanted to continually remind them the event was coming up and that they needed to be prepared for it. We helped groups plan their onsite fundraisers. We helped people learn how to sign up online for the event. We even helped a few people with their online payments. I now saw why Relay For Life needed chairs specifically for Greek Life.
As a result of our efforts, the Greek participation actually increased by 25% from the previous year’s involvement. The fundraising had also increased, and I think that many of the people I spoke with on a regular basis attended and had a lot of fun. Once we made it to the event, my job was technically over, but I helped set up and take care of day of issues. I also stayed to clean up after Relay had ended. It was incredible how many people could fit on McMicken Commons. Many of the Greek organizations had their onsite fundraisers that I helped them establish. It was really cool to see the fruits of my labor out on the Commons.
Since my freshmen year, I have continued to be involved with Relay For Life as the Greek Recruitment Chair. I set up a mailing list of the chapter presidents and the contacts for each chapter. The contact for each chapter changes every year, but the previous year’s contact will provide me with a new point of contact within their chapter. I’m sure it is annoying to them, but one email to provide a good communication basis for Relay is not a big deal.
I have also expanded my presence and responsibilities within our organization. It was establish early (earlier than I would like to admit) that I am one of those people who gets excited and obnoxious as peoples spirits start to dwindle throughout the night. When people on our committee get tired, I am there to scream in their faces and wake them up. This year, I told jokes in the middle of the night just to keep the people at Relay entertained. I like to make a fool out of myself if it helps the people around me get through whatever challenge we are facing.
For the past two years, I was the unofficially the official photographer for Relay For Life. Using my camera, I would go around and take pictures of people’s onsite fundraisers, special events taking place at Relay, and just general goings on. Each year I have taken approximately 400-500 photos. This year, I was able to post them on my Google account for others to access. The News Record even used many of my pictures in their article on Relay For Life at UC hitting $1,000,000 fundraised since it began on our campus.
This past year (2012), I took it upon myself to be the motivational DJ in the late hours of the morning as Relay was wrapping up. I played songs that most people know the dances to. We had about 40-50 people out in front of TUC dancing and making fools of themselves. UC happened to be having an open house for prospective students that day, and I’m sure we left a memorable impression for all of them. My time as the DJ was aptly named “Nate Bodenschatz’s DJ Power Hour”. People enjoyed it so much that they asked for a second one. During the second hour, I led our clean-up efforts while we all sang and danced. So many people were invigorated that it took us much less time to clean up than usual, and we were able to enjoy the last half hour of the event without anything else to worry about. It was incredible.
I hope that I was able to help and inspire people at Relay and on our committee. I never had the most important job for our organization, but I wanted to help as much as possible in the best ways I knew how. I used my strengths to add value and character to the event. Unfortunately, I will be out of the country next year during Relay, but I am hoping to be with everyone in spirit. Perhaps I will make mix CDs to continue the tradition of the Nate Bodenschatz DJ Power Hour.
My efforts to be positive and keep up my energy when everyone else was crashing helped prolong the life of the event. I like to think that without me, everyone would have been drudging along; not wanting to help clean up. With our dance marathon, we brought back the energy and excitement to Relay. It was the perfect way to close out the event.
Hopefully those people will remember the fun times we had at the end of Relay and come back next year. With more people spreading the word of how enjoyable Relay For Life is, our attendance will increase. With increased attendance, we will have increased fundraising. Increased fundraising will lead to an increase in the number of lives we can help and save, and that’s really what it’s all about: giving back to an organization that helped my family so that it can continue to help families across the country.