Jogging on down the yellow brick road
Mikaela Avery - Contributing Writer
On Thursday, April 3rd, Order of Omega, the Greek life honor society, held their second ever jog-a-thon which raised over $175 for the Special Olympics Illinois Region.
Brontë de Zwart, president of Order of Omega, said: “Our focus for the semester is physical wellness and promoting that amongst college students and it tied in perfectly with the philanthropy that we started last semester, which was raising money for the Special Olympics.”
Each fraternity teamed up with one of the sororities on campus. For every $5 a team raised, a team member jogged a mile around campus. Winners were the team that raised the most money and completed the most laps. With a total of $95 and 19 miles, Pi Beta Phi and Sigma Phi Epsilon earned first place.
“I really like the competitiveness of it, but at the same time how different Greek organizations are collaborating with each other, which is not something we always do,” said de Zwart. “There’s the competitive spirit, but also you get to bond with people outside of your chapter.”
For this semester’s jog-a-thon, Order of Omega incorporated this year’s Greek Week theme, Wicked, through chalk. Joggers were guided along the route by pink and green arrows, patches of yellow bricks, black witch hats, encouraging messages, and of course the iconic red slipper.