Buff pride reigned supreme this past week as students, alumni and Buffalo fans flocked to the many activities that a WTAMU homecoming has to offer. This year, like in years past, fraternities and sororities floated into the homecoming scene.
“Fraternities and sororities team up to do homecoming floats and make up a pretty large percentage of the large homecoming floats that we have each year,” Associate Director of Student Activities Matt Maples said.
“They are really involved in all of the activities, but their primary focus is the floats for the parade and the tailgating before the game,” Maples said. “It’s the Greek groups that are competing for ‘The Tailgating Challenges.’”
Although it might seem like a good time, there is a lot of work and planning leading up to the parade.
“We are paired with [Kappa Alpha] and we have been working for the past few weeks and up through this week to prepare our float. A lot of people think that Greek life is just a party. It is definitely a lot of work, but we pride ourselves in getting involved at WT,” Andrea Fuller, president of Chi Omega, said.
This year, Fuller’s sorority was creative with their theme as they used a play on words and some classic rock for inspiration.
“We are doing thunderstruck AC/DC style, so we’re trying to add a little flavor to the theme this year,” said Fuller.
“This and Shack-A-Thon are the best for getting Greeks involved and intermixed with students on campus,” Fuller said. “I think it shows that we are not secluded. We are students who are participants in everything that goes on, in campus.”
“Anytime that we have the opportunity to become more involved on campus, it’s great,” Fuller said. “Honestly, it’s kind of a marketing strategy by getting people involved and wanting to go through recruitment next year, when you see us having fun, that we are involved, and that we are students first and WT comes first. It’s just a great strategy for us.”
However, floats are not always the main focus as some fraternities pride themselves on their cooking abilities.
“For the past three years we have won the best meat award, so what happens is the school goes out and they try every organization and fraternity’s cookout and we have won it for the past three years,” Josh Olvera, public relations representative for Omega Delta Phi, said. “This is our biggest thing for homecoming.”
“We are involved in homecoming to represent and lead as an example to have fun, and be positively involved through the WT community,” Seth Blackwell, Alpha Tau Omega float chair, said.
