Theta Delta Chi
Encyclopedia
Theta Delta Chi is a social fraternity
that was founded in 1847 at Union College
. While nickname
s differ from institution to institution, the most common nicknames for the fraternity are Theta Delt, Thete, TDX, and TDC. Theta Delta Chi brothers refer to their local organization as Charges rather than using the common fraternity nomenclature of chapter.
, Theodore Brown, Andrew H. Green
, William Hyslop, and Samuel F. Wile . In 1849, Green and Akin along with Francis Martindale (the first initiate), organized the Beta Charge (later renamed Beta Proteron) at Ballston Law School
. However, two years later the school itself moved and the new Charge was disbanded and the members put on Alpha's rolls.
During the 1850s Theta Delta Chi spread rapidly, adding Charges at Vermont
, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
, William and Mary
, Virginia
, Hobart
, Wesleyan
, Harvard
, Brown
, Bowdoin
, Kenyon
, Tufts
, Washington and Jefferson
, and North Carolina
. Few of these remained active for long, although several were later revived. Kappa at Tufts, founded in 1856, presently enjoys the honor of being the oldest active Charge in continuous existence .
During the 1860s new Charges, at, among other institutions, Lafayette
and Rochester
(1867), Hamilton (1868), and Dartmouth
(1869), continued to be chartered at a pace that kept slightly ahead of attrition caused by Charges going inactive. The Civil War, however, severely weakened most Charges as men left for military service; many of the earliest Charges went inactive during this period, and expansion in the South ceased for half a century .
Only after 1870 did Theta Delta Chi begin to acquire its present configuration. Westward expansion had traditionally been opposed by a large segment of the Fraternity, which worried that supervision and solidarity would suffer if Theta Delta Chi were to stray far from the East. The rise of the large state universities in the West, particularly in the Big Ten
, eventually overcame that resistance and Michigan
, Minnesota
, and Wisconsin
welcomed Theta Delta Chi between 1889 and 1895 . Further Midwest expansion included Illinois
(1908) and Iowa State
(1919). Berkeley
(1900), Stanford
(1903), the University of Washington
(1913) and UCLA (1929) brought Theta Delta Chi in strength to the Pacific coast
.
Expansion in the East during the 1870s, 1880s and 1890s brought Charges to Cornell
, Boston University
, Wabash
, CCNY, Columbia
, Lehigh
, Amherst
, Yale
, MIT, Williams
, and George Washington. Pennsylvania
(1915) was the last Eastern Charge to become active before World War I
, although 1904 and 1910 saw the reactivation of the Southern Charges, Epsilon and Nu .
Theta Delta Chi became an International Fraternity with charterings at McGill
(1901) and Toronto
(1912) .
The Great Depression
and the Second World War saw a number of Charges go inactive and brought a halt to expansion . At its Centennial Convention in 1947, Theta Delta Chi stood at 28 Charges, a number that would begin to increase only in the 1950s.
The annual Convention has evolved into a major international assembling of Theta Delts at which all Charges are represented by undergraduate and graduate delegates and at which the major business of the Fraternity is transacted.
The 1881 Convention required that the President of the Grand Lodge visit every Charge once a year; Central Fraternity Office staff now performs these duties . In 1869, the first issue of The Shield was produced, qualifying it as the oldest fraternity magazine. Although it lapsed after one issue, The Shield was revived in 1884 and has been published continually since then .
The Central Fraternity Office, or CFO, evolved over many decades from a virtually one-man job, filled by a Grand Lodge member, and housed in the now defunct Theta Delta Chi Club in New York City, to a professional staff consisting of an Executive Director, a Director of Charge Operations, , a Director of Expansion, a Director of Charge Development, a Systems Administrator and one or more undergraduate interns, referred to as Member Service Coordinators . The office currently operates from 214 Lewis Wharf in Boston, Massachusetts.
The financial health of Theta Delta Chi was ensured through the establishment of two entities, the Founders' Corporation in 1910 and the Educational Foundation in 1944 . Any Theta Delt may join the Corporation on payment of $250 and thereby vote at its annual meetings. It also receives bequests and holds and invests all funds for the benefit of the Fraternity. The Educational Foundation, a 501 (c)(3) public charity, receives bequests and owns the property occupied by the CFO and other assets. It funds the educational activities of the Fraternity.
, Penn State, Arizona State
, Rhode Island
, Michigan State
, Santa Barbara
, Calgary
, Virginia Tech, and Virginia Commonwealth
; Bucknell
was rechartered also. Several of these charterings brought into being some of the strongest Charges in the Fraternity, but in the increasingly uncertain climate of those times, with anti-fraternity sentiment gaining strength on a number of campuses, a significant number went inactive . The 1992 rechartering at Wabash continued a pattern of reviving inactive Charges; new charterings in the 1990s and 2000 include Northeastern, Nova Southeastern
, UNC Greensboro, SUNY Albany and Merrimack
. The Fort Lauderdale, FL and Greensboro, NC Charges marked a significant re-entry into the South .
With the start of the new millennium, Theta Delta Chi has worked to revive several of its defunct Charges, while installing Charges on new campuses. The Chi Charge, founded in 1867, and active for most of the time since then was re-chartered in the summer of 2002 at the 155th Annual Convention. Following a brief closure, the Epsilon Charge returned to the active ranks in August 2004. Theta Delta Chi has also worked to increase its presence in the northeast with the installation of the Iota Triton Charge at UMass Dartmouth in 2005.
Yet the active Charge roll call remains in flux, as the fraternity has lost several Charges, young and old, since 2001; losing Omicron Triton at URI (2001), Psi Deuteron at UCLA (2003), Nu Deuteron at Lehigh (2004), Delta Triton at Northeastern (2005), Eta Triton at Nova Southeastern (2005), Mu Deuteron at Amherst (2006), and Rho Triton at VCU (2009). While these losses are disheartening, the Grand Lodge and Central Fraternity Office have worked progressively for the betterment of the fraternity, and Theta Delta Chi enters the future with the most stable foundation it has had in nearly a decade.
The last two years have been marked by a significant period of growth for Theta Delta Chi. Following the chartering of the Theta Triton Charge at Binghamton University
in 2007 , the fraternity chartered four Charges in 2008; reviving the Epsilon Triton Charge at Arizona State University http://www.epsilontriton.org and the Rho Proteron Charge at the University of South Carolina
, while chartering the Tau Triton Charge at Marist College
and the Lambda Triton Charge at Rutgers University
who were also winners of the Victory Cup naming them the best overall charge. In March 2009, the Gamma Deuteron Charge at the University of Michigan returned to the active roles of the fraternity. In February of 2010 Psi Deuteron at UCLA was rechartered, putting the present roll standing at 29 Charges. In addition, Theta Delta Chi has colonies at Hobart College and Indiana University.
Finally, in April 2007, the Grand Lodge hosted the inaugural Preamble Institute for its undergraduate leaders, ever hoping to improve the intellectual, moral and social being of its brotherhood. With other programming initiatives on the horizon, the fraternity seems poised for success in the coming years.
Fraternities and sororities
Fraternities and sororities are fraternal social organizations for undergraduate students. In Latin, the term refers mainly to such organizations at colleges and universities in the United States, although it is also applied to analogous European groups also known as corporations...
that was founded in 1847 at Union College
Union College
Union College is a private, non-denominational liberal arts college located in Schenectady, New York, United States. Founded in 1795, it was the first institution of higher learning chartered by the New York State Board of Regents. In the 19th century, it became the "Mother of Fraternities", as...
. While nickname
Nickname
A nickname is "a usually familiar or humorous but sometimes pointed or cruel name given to a person or place, as a supposedly appropriate replacement for or addition to the proper name.", or a name similar in origin and pronunciation from the original name....
s differ from institution to institution, the most common nicknames for the fraternity are Theta Delt, Thete, TDX, and TDC. Theta Delta Chi brothers refer to their local organization as Charges rather than using the common fraternity nomenclature of chapter.
Origins and growth
Theta Delta Chi, the eleventh oldest of the college fraternities, was founded in 1847 at Union College in Schenectady, NY by six members of the class of 1849: William G. Akin, Abel BeachAbel Beach
Abel Beach , born in Groton, New York, was a well-known poet and one of the six founders of the international fraternity Theta Delta Chi.-Biography:...
, Theodore Brown, Andrew H. Green
Andrew H. Green
Andrew H. Green was one of the founders of Theta Delta Chi fraternity at Union College in Schenectady, NY, along with Abel Beach, Samuel F. Wile, Theodore B. Brown, William Hyslop, and William G. Akin...
, William Hyslop, and Samuel F. Wile . In 1849, Green and Akin along with Francis Martindale (the first initiate), organized the Beta Charge (later renamed Beta Proteron) at Ballston Law School
State and National Law School
State and National Law School was an early practical training law school founded in 1849 by John W. Fowler in Ballston Spa, New York located in Saratoga County. It was also known as New York State and National Law School, Ballston Law School, and Fowler's State and National Law School. In 1853 the...
. However, two years later the school itself moved and the new Charge was disbanded and the members put on Alpha's rolls.
During the 1850s Theta Delta Chi spread rapidly, adding Charges at Vermont
University of Vermont
The University of Vermont comprises seven undergraduate schools, an honors college, a graduate college, and a college of medicine. The Honors College does not offer its own degrees; students in the Honors College concurrently enroll in one of the university's seven undergraduate colleges or...
, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Stephen Van Rensselaer established the Rensselaer School on November 5, 1824 with a letter to the Rev. Dr. Samuel Blatchford, in which van Rensselaer asked Blatchford to serve as the first president. Within the letter he set down several orders of business. He appointed Amos Eaton as the school's...
, William and Mary
College of William and Mary
The College of William & Mary in Virginia is a public research university located in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States...
, Virginia
University of Virginia
The University of Virginia is a public research university located in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States, founded by Thomas Jefferson...
, Hobart
Hobart and William Smith Colleges
Hobart and William Smith Colleges, located in Geneva, New York, are together a liberal arts college offering Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor of Science and Master of Arts in Teaching degrees. In athletics, however, the two schools compete with separate teams, known as the Hobart Statesmen and the...
, Wesleyan
Wesleyan University
Wesleyan University is a private liberal arts college founded in 1831 and located in Middletown, Connecticut. According to the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Wesleyan is the only Baccalaureate College in the nation that emphasizes undergraduate instruction in the arts and...
, Harvard
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
, Brown
Brown University
Brown University is a private, Ivy League university located in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. Founded in 1764 prior to American independence from the British Empire as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations early in the reign of King George III ,...
, Bowdoin
Bowdoin College
Bowdoin College , founded in 1794, is an elite private liberal arts college located in the coastal Maine town of Brunswick, Maine. As of 2011, U.S. News and World Report ranks Bowdoin 6th among liberal arts colleges in the United States. At times, it was ranked as high as 4th in the country. It is...
, Kenyon
Kenyon College
Kenyon College is a private liberal arts college in Gambier, Ohio, founded in 1824 by Bishop Philander Chase of The Episcopal Church, in parallel with the Bexley Hall seminary. It is the oldest private college in Ohio...
, Tufts
Tufts University
Tufts University is a private research university located in Medford/Somerville, near Boston, Massachusetts. It is organized into ten schools, including two undergraduate programs and eight graduate divisions, on four campuses in Massachusetts and on the eastern border of France...
, Washington and Jefferson
Greek organizations at Washington & Jefferson College
Washington & Jefferson College is host to 10 Greek organizations and a significant percentage of the undergraduate student body is active in Greek life. With 37% of the student body participating in "greek life," The Princeton Review named Washington & Jefferson College 12th on their 2010 list of...
, and North Carolina
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a public research university located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States...
. Few of these remained active for long, although several were later revived. Kappa at Tufts, founded in 1856, presently enjoys the honor of being the oldest active Charge in continuous existence .
During the 1860s new Charges, at, among other institutions, Lafayette
Lafayette College
Lafayette College is a private coeducational liberal arts and engineering college located in Easton, Pennsylvania, USA. The school, founded in 1826 by James Madison Porter,son of General Andrew Porter of Norristown and citizens of Easton, first began holding classes in 1832...
and Rochester
University of Rochester
The University of Rochester is a private, nonsectarian, research university in Rochester, New York, United States. The university grants undergraduate and graduate degrees, including doctoral and professional degrees. The university has six schools and various interdisciplinary programs.The...
(1867), Hamilton (1868), and Dartmouth
Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College is a private, Ivy League university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. The institution comprises a liberal arts college, Dartmouth Medical School, Thayer School of Engineering, and the Tuck School of Business, as well as 19 graduate programs in the arts and sciences...
(1869), continued to be chartered at a pace that kept slightly ahead of attrition caused by Charges going inactive. The Civil War, however, severely weakened most Charges as men left for military service; many of the earliest Charges went inactive during this period, and expansion in the South ceased for half a century .
Only after 1870 did Theta Delta Chi begin to acquire its present configuration. Westward expansion had traditionally been opposed by a large segment of the Fraternity, which worried that supervision and solidarity would suffer if Theta Delta Chi were to stray far from the East. The rise of the large state universities in the West, particularly in the Big Ten
Big Ten Conference
The Big Ten Conference is the United States' oldest Division I college athletic conference. Its twelve member institutions are located primarily in the Midwestern United States, stretching from Nebraska in the west to Pennsylvania in the east...
, eventually overcame that resistance and Michigan
University of Michigan
The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...
, Minnesota
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...
, and Wisconsin
University of Wisconsin–Madison
The University of Wisconsin–Madison is a public research university located in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. Founded in 1848, UW–Madison is the flagship campus of the University of Wisconsin System. It became a land-grant institution in 1866...
welcomed Theta Delta Chi between 1889 and 1895 . Further Midwest expansion included Illinois
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign is a large public research-intensive university in the state of Illinois, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system...
(1908) and Iowa State
Iowa State University
Iowa State University of Science and Technology, more commonly known as Iowa State University , is a public land-grant and space-grant research university located in Ames, Iowa, United States. Iowa State has produced astronauts, scientists, and Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners, along with a host of...
(1919). Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
(1900), Stanford
Stanford University
The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...
(1903), the University of Washington
University of Washington
University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...
(1913) and UCLA (1929) brought Theta Delta Chi in strength to the Pacific coast
Pacific Coast
A country's Pacific coast is the part of its coast bordering the Pacific Ocean.-The Americas:Countries on the western side of the Americas have a Pacific coast as their western border.* Geography of Canada* Geography of Chile* Geography of Colombia...
.
Expansion in the East during the 1870s, 1880s and 1890s brought Charges to Cornell
Cornell University
Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...
, Boston University
Boston University
Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
, Wabash
Wabash College
Wabash College is a small, private, liberal arts college for men, located in Crawfordsville, Indiana. Along with Hampden-Sydney College and Morehouse College, Wabash is one of only three remaining traditional all-men's liberal arts colleges in the United States.-History:Wabash College was founded...
, CCNY, Columbia
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
, Lehigh
Lehigh University
Lehigh University is a private, co-educational university located in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in the Lehigh Valley region of the United States. It was established in 1865 by Asa Packer as a four-year technical school, but has grown to include studies in a wide variety of disciplines...
, Amherst
Amherst College
Amherst College is a private liberal arts college located in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States. Amherst is an exclusively undergraduate four-year institution and enrolled 1,744 students in the fall of 2009...
, Yale
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
, MIT, Williams
Williams College
Williams College is a private liberal arts college located in Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States. It was established in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim Williams. Originally a men's college, Williams became co-educational in 1970. Fraternities were also phased out during this...
, and George Washington. Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
(1915) was the last Eastern Charge to become active before World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, although 1904 and 1910 saw the reactivation of the Southern Charges, Epsilon and Nu .
Theta Delta Chi became an International Fraternity with charterings at McGill
McGill University
Mohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...
(1901) and Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
(1912) .
The Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
and the Second World War saw a number of Charges go inactive and brought a halt to expansion . At its Centennial Convention in 1947, Theta Delta Chi stood at 28 Charges, a number that would begin to increase only in the 1950s.
Institutional development
The institutions of the Fraternity slowly took shape during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In 1867 anti-fraternity sentiment at Union led to the disbanding of the Alpha. As the Mother Charge, Alpha had exercised governing power over the Fraternity, but her demise, although temporary, brought about the creation of the Grand Lodge by action of the eight surviving Charges at the Convention of 1868 . The Grand Lodge, originally three and now five officers (of whom two are undergraduates) remains the elected governing body of the Fraternity to this day (Alpha was rechartered in 1923, although executive power has remained with the Grand Lodge) .The annual Convention has evolved into a major international assembling of Theta Delts at which all Charges are represented by undergraduate and graduate delegates and at which the major business of the Fraternity is transacted.
The 1881 Convention required that the President of the Grand Lodge visit every Charge once a year; Central Fraternity Office staff now performs these duties . In 1869, the first issue of The Shield was produced, qualifying it as the oldest fraternity magazine. Although it lapsed after one issue, The Shield was revived in 1884 and has been published continually since then .
The Central Fraternity Office, or CFO, evolved over many decades from a virtually one-man job, filled by a Grand Lodge member, and housed in the now defunct Theta Delta Chi Club in New York City, to a professional staff consisting of an Executive Director, a Director of Charge Operations, , a Director of Expansion, a Director of Charge Development, a Systems Administrator and one or more undergraduate interns, referred to as Member Service Coordinators . The office currently operates from 214 Lewis Wharf in Boston, Massachusetts.
The financial health of Theta Delta Chi was ensured through the establishment of two entities, the Founders' Corporation in 1910 and the Educational Foundation in 1944 . Any Theta Delt may join the Corporation on payment of $250 and thereby vote at its annual meetings. It also receives bequests and holds and invests all funds for the benefit of the Fraternity. The Educational Foundation, a 501 (c)(3) public charity, receives bequests and owns the property occupied by the CFO and other assets. It funds the educational activities of the Fraternity.
Modern expansion
Between 1951 and 1970 the Fraternity added Charges at NorthwesternNorthwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....
, Penn State, Arizona State
Arizona State University
Arizona State University is a public research university located in the Phoenix Metropolitan Area of the State of Arizona...
, Rhode Island
University of Rhode Island
The University of Rhode Island is the principal public research university in the U.S. state of Rhode Island. Its main campus is located in Kingston. Additional campuses include the Feinstein Campus in Providence, the Narragansett Bay Campus in Narragansett, and the W. Alton Jones Campus in West...
, Michigan State
Michigan State University
Michigan State University is a public research university in East Lansing, Michigan, USA. Founded in 1855, it was the pioneer land-grant institution and served as a model for future land-grant colleges in the United States under the 1862 Morrill Act.MSU pioneered the studies of packaging,...
, Santa Barbara
University of California, Santa Barbara
The University of California, Santa Barbara, commonly known as UCSB or UC Santa Barbara, is a public research university and one of the 10 general campuses of the University of California system. The main campus is located on a site in Goleta, California, from Santa Barbara and northwest of Los...
, Calgary
University of Calgary
The University of Calgary is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1966 the U of C is composed of 14 faculties and more than 85 research institutes and centres.More than 25,000 undergraduate and 5,500 graduate students are currently...
, Virginia Tech, and Virginia Commonwealth
Virginia Commonwealth University
Virginia Commonwealth University is a public university located in Richmond, Virginia. It comprises two campuses in the Downtown Richmond area, the product of a merger between the Richmond Professional Institute and the Medical College of Virginia in 1968...
; Bucknell
Bucknell University
Bucknell University is a private liberal arts university located alongside the West Branch Susquehanna River in the rolling countryside of Central Pennsylvania in the town of Lewisburg, 30 miles southeast of Williamsport and 60 miles north of Harrisburg. The university consists of the College of...
was rechartered also. Several of these charterings brought into being some of the strongest Charges in the Fraternity, but in the increasingly uncertain climate of those times, with anti-fraternity sentiment gaining strength on a number of campuses, a significant number went inactive . The 1992 rechartering at Wabash continued a pattern of reviving inactive Charges; new charterings in the 1990s and 2000 include Northeastern, Nova Southeastern
Nova Southeastern University
Nova Southeastern University, commonly referred to as NSU or Nova, is a private, coeducational, nonsectarian, research university located in Broward County, Florida, with its main campus in the town of Davie...
, UNC Greensboro, SUNY Albany and Merrimack
Merrimack College
Merrimack College is an independent college in the Roman Catholic, Augustinian tradition located in North Andover, Massachusetts, north of Boston, Massachusetts. It offers undergraduate degrees in business, education, science, engineering, and the liberal arts...
. The Fort Lauderdale, FL and Greensboro, NC Charges marked a significant re-entry into the South .
With the start of the new millennium, Theta Delta Chi has worked to revive several of its defunct Charges, while installing Charges on new campuses. The Chi Charge, founded in 1867, and active for most of the time since then was re-chartered in the summer of 2002 at the 155th Annual Convention. Following a brief closure, the Epsilon Charge returned to the active ranks in August 2004. Theta Delta Chi has also worked to increase its presence in the northeast with the installation of the Iota Triton Charge at UMass Dartmouth in 2005.
Yet the active Charge roll call remains in flux, as the fraternity has lost several Charges, young and old, since 2001; losing Omicron Triton at URI (2001), Psi Deuteron at UCLA (2003), Nu Deuteron at Lehigh (2004), Delta Triton at Northeastern (2005), Eta Triton at Nova Southeastern (2005), Mu Deuteron at Amherst (2006), and Rho Triton at VCU (2009). While these losses are disheartening, the Grand Lodge and Central Fraternity Office have worked progressively for the betterment of the fraternity, and Theta Delta Chi enters the future with the most stable foundation it has had in nearly a decade.
The last two years have been marked by a significant period of growth for Theta Delta Chi. Following the chartering of the Theta Triton Charge at Binghamton University
Binghamton University
Binghamton University, also formally called State University of New York at Binghamton, , is a public research university in the State of New York. The University is one of the four university centers in the State University of New York system...
in 2007 , the fraternity chartered four Charges in 2008; reviving the Epsilon Triton Charge at Arizona State University http://www.epsilontriton.org and the Rho Proteron Charge at the University of South Carolina
University of South Carolina
The University of South Carolina is a public, co-educational research university located in Columbia, South Carolina, United States, with 7 surrounding satellite campuses. Its historic campus covers over in downtown Columbia not far from the South Carolina State House...
, while chartering the Tau Triton Charge at Marist College
Marist College
Marist College is a private liberal arts college on the east bank of the Hudson River near Poughkeepsie, New York. The site was established in 1905 by Marist Brothers, and the college was chartered in 1929...
and the Lambda Triton Charge at Rutgers University
Rutgers University
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey , is the largest institution for higher education in New Jersey, United States. It was originally chartered as Queen's College in 1766. It is the eighth-oldest college in the United States and one of the nine Colonial colleges founded before the American...
who were also winners of the Victory Cup naming them the best overall charge. In March 2009, the Gamma Deuteron Charge at the University of Michigan returned to the active roles of the fraternity. In February of 2010 Psi Deuteron at UCLA was rechartered, putting the present roll standing at 29 Charges. In addition, Theta Delta Chi has colonies at Hobart College and Indiana University.
Finally, in April 2007, the Grand Lodge hosted the inaugural Preamble Institute for its undergraduate leaders, ever hoping to improve the intellectual, moral and social being of its brotherhood. With other programming initiatives on the horizon, the fraternity seems poised for success in the coming years.
Charges and Colonies
External links
- Theta Delta Chi - Official site
- Baird's Manual 1879