Meet the 2014 Pledge Class

These lovely ladies were all initiated into our chapter a few weeks ago. They all bring a lot to the chapter and we're so excited to welcome them to our sisterhood. At a New Member meeting a few weeks ago, we wanted to get to know them a little bit more... Here's what they told us!

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Recruitment 2014

Throughout the week of August 18-23, our chapter held formal recruitment. It was a long week of conversations, rap battles, and learning to love our sisterhood even more, but we survived! We were fortunate enough to welcome 45 new members into our sisterhood! While recruitment week can be very stressful, it is also one of the most exciting weeks of the year. A few of our sisters tell us what recruitment week was like for them:

Welcome home, baby pandas!

Senior Charlie: "I knew that I would cry on three party day when we did our Rose Ceremony, but I had no idea that it would be happy tears. I am so incredibly thankful to have been offered a bid

into AOII three years ago; my life would not be the same without the beautiful women I am surrounded by each day."

Senior Jaclyn: "Seeing all the new member run to our house on bid day made me think of how this house has helped me grow over the last 3 years and how it is going to be the best four years of their lives like it was for me. If it wasn't for my bid card saying Alpha Omicron Pi I truly would not be the woman I am today."

Sophomore Katie: "My favorite part of bid day was being as excited as the new members were to have then run down the street!"

Sophomore Madison: "I was surprised how much more I loved the other side of recruitment this year. As a sophomore, I remembered clearly how I was looking for genuine people in a house the previous year. I had the amazing opportunity to share with others why I love my house as much as I do this go around, and I generously expressed how the woman of alpha omicron pi challenge me to be the best version of myself on a daily basis. Seeing the new members' excitement to be a part of something bigger than themselves renewed in me a great love for my sisters, one I never would have imagined."

Junior Taylor: "My favorite part of bid day was truly seeing all of my sisters bond. Even while I was watching the older girls, it looked like we were interacting as if it were the first time we met. On bid day, you can really feel the excitement and electricity in the air as we finally get to meet the new baby pandas and rekindle the memories of past bid days. The excitement and electricity is almost tangible; the connection between everyone is so powerful! It's something really special and moving."

Junior Shelby: "This year, I disaffiliated from the chapter to serve as a Rho Gamma, or Recruitment Guide. While it's tough to distance yourself from the chapter throughout the week in order to help girls find their home away from home, it made me realize just how much AOII means to me!"

We are so excited to get to know our new members and share with them everything we love about our sisterhood! ALFA.

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New Student Enrollment Orientation Leader, Liz

One of our sisters was selected as an orientation leader for the summer. As we get ready for classes to start back up, read what Liz has to say about her experience!

Our sister Liz, third from the left in the second row from the bottom, and the rest of the UNL NSE leaders!

This summer I was honored to have the opportunity of being a New Student Enrollment Orientation Leader. I worked with a talented group of current UNL students, and made great friends along the way. In addition, I had the chance to meet a lot of the new students coming to the University this fall. I was able to teach them to sign up for classes. While sometimes it was a struggle to make schedules match, I always tried to accommodate for each individual student that I helped. 

Along with helping students sign up for classes, I took groups of new students on their UNL experience.  It was always a great time to really get to know some of the students before they get to campus this fall.  While getting to know each other with goofy ice breakers and games, I told them of my experiences here at UNL.  

Being an NSE Orientation Leader was an amazing experience.  At times it may have been stressful and fast-paced, but I would recommend it to everyone.  Good memories, friends, and experiences were had. 

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Sisterhood of the Traveling Pandas: Jaclyn's Sri Lankan Experience

Our sister Jaclyn had the amazing chance to spend the summer in Sri Lanka and writes about the experience here:

"This summer I had the opportunity to do a volunteer service learning trip to Sri Lanka. One of my professors, Sriyani Tidball, founded a non-profit organization in the slum beaches of Dehiwela 32 years ago, called Community Concerns. I would like to do International Human Rights Law in the future, so Sriyani insisted I volunteer at Community Concerns during the summer. I jumped at the opportunity and here I am a year later in Sri Lanka. A Nebraska Chi Omega, Elise Polly, is volunteering with me in Sri Lanka as well.

Community Concerns has too many projects to keep track of so I'll share a little bit about two projects I have worked with. Salvage Jewelry is a company that makes jewelry out of recycled materials like kite surfing fabric, magazines, newspapers, and scrap leather. All of the jewelry is made by women that cannot afford to leave their homes because they have to take care of children. Salvage Jewelry allows them to make jewelry at home and get paid per bead or per piece they make. I help several days a week in their main office making tags, cards, and cutting paper for the women to make beads out of.

The next project I work with is the Baby Clinic, where I help every Wednesday. The Baby Clinic helps around 80 moms, 5 dads, and over 80 children each week. Most of these women have been abused, left by their husbands or widowed.

Each week the women are given a lesson and this past week was my turn to give the lesson. My lesson was on women and children's rights. Because of the culture here in Sri Lanka, their rights are different. I worked with Punesh, the woman who runs the Baby Clinic, in order to understand their culture and their rights, but still empower these women and give them a sense of what rights they do have. Most of them did not even know about many of the rights that I had presented. After the lessons each week, we hand out a snack for the child, like powdered milk and a bar of soup or vitamins.  Being able to educate these women has been one of the most rewarding experiences I have had in Sri Lanka.

 Along with these projects, there is also a child sponsorship program (I am now a sponsor of a boy who is going into University), an elders program, a drug rehab center for men, a safe house for abused and trafficked women, a Montessori school, a primary school, and an after school program. I have worked with every single one of these projects and can't even begin to describe how Community Concerns has changed so many lives.

On the weekends I get to travel and see more of Sri Lanka. My first stop was to the cultural triangle in the middle of Sri Lanka to learn about the history of the island. The next was to Arugam Bay which is one of the top surfing places in the world and yes, I did surf. I also traveled to Kandy and Nuwara Eliya which are two quant little towns. Then to climb Adam's Peak, which is the second tallest mountain in Sri Lanka! You climb 5,000 steps that are as tall as your knees, and the mountain is sacred to Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, and Christians.

Jaclyn made it to the top of Adam's Peak, a sacred mountain for Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, and Christians.

Throughout this experience I have learned a lot about myself and other cultures. It has been such an amazing experience and I hope I get to come back in years to come. I can't wait to home to my AOII girls, but will truly miss Sri Lanka and the amazing people I have met.

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