This week I had the honor of sitting down with Danica Hoose, President of Omega Phi Alpha here at the University of Kansas. Last week, OPA issued a statement that’s generated quite a lot of buzz around not just our campus, but schools all over the country. The statement goes as follows:
“As a national service sorority, Omega Phi Alpha focuses on six areas of service. Since our inception, the most important of these areas is mental health. Due to our commitment to mental health and our oath to our national organization, the Alpha Kappa Chapter here at the University of Kansas cannot sit by and merely listen to the pain of our fellow students.
In light of recent events and conversations surrounding Ferguson, Baltimore, Leelah Alcorn, sexual assault, the Rock Chalk Revue incident, the Islamaphobic Yeti video and much more affecting the mental health of KU students, we, the Alpha Kappa Chapter of Omega Phi Alpha, have decided to take action.
We’ve listened to our peers at KU, including members of our own sorority, express fear, outrage, exhaustion, and courage. We value your voices, mental safety, and lives. We admire your strength and affirm your concerns and struggles.
This is why, as a chapter, we shall:
1) Create a Social Justice Sub-chair to be added to our Service Committee to ensure we’re always planning and completing social justice minded service projects,
2) Require Cultural Competency and Mental Health First Aid Training for our members and encourage other Greek and Non-Greek organizations to require their own, and
3) Donate $2000 to establish a fund over the summer to defray the costs of CAPS services for multicultural students, and work to make this fund sustainable for years to come.”
In light of this incredible step forward for the Greek Community, I decided to ask Danica a few questions.
What drove you and OPA to make this addition to your sorority?
“It came to our attention that we had been bunched in with this fear of the Greek community when the controversial Islamophobic Yeti video was released. A couple of our members, myself included, were very disheartened and upset about that fact that representing the Greek community could upset or trigger someone, or make them feel uncomfortable in any way. That’s when we realized that, as an organization, we failed to create a safe and inclusive environment for all students, regardless of over half our sorority identify as white. Even though we in our own chambers recognize our own diversity and girls feel safe, we want to make sure that people on campus seeing our letters also feel that. That sense of community, and that safety, and that knowledge, that this girl wearing those letters will have your back. So, I brought this statement to our chapter and it was one of the longest discussions we’ve ever had. We had a conversation to educate people of the current situations, and it ended up being the least close vote we’ve ever had. It was almost unanimous, very widely accepted. I was very proud and happy to see that. One of the things we want to see from this is encouragement to other organizations to follow suit. On campus, we’re seen as not in Greek and we’re seen as Greek at the same time. We’ve kind of adopted this middle ground approach, and we think that positions us as unique leaders to be able to say, ‘Hey student organizations, you guys should look into these issues that apply to your organizations.’ We want to play both sides of the field.”
What do you hope to see this initiative do on campus?
“It’s gotten a lot of feedback as being this really great, revolutionary thing, but honestly, it’s very small steps. Plans to make plans within our sorority. While it’s guaranteed that we will be more socially justice minded, we will have a basic cultural competency level. It’s just very small steps. Long Term, I hope that this makes Omega Phi Alpha a force to be reckoned with, this avenue for change, this area of safety, this truly safe zone. A place where people can come to and know they will be valued and respected in this environment. Furthermore, we really hope to encourage other organizations to get in on social competency training and social justice minded work. I think it would go a long way to make this campus feel safe, and be safe.”