State of the Organization – 2018

State of Alpha Sigma Kappa – Women in Technical Studies
Date: April 2019

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Table of Contents:
National Director of Administration
National Director of Expansion
National Director of Finance
National Director of Operations
National Director of Records
Alpha Active
*Alpha Alum
Beta Active
Beta Alum
Epsilon Active
Epsilon Alum
Zeta Active
Zeta Alum
Eta Active
Theta Active
*Auxiliary Chapter
Iota Active
*Iota Alum
*Kappa Active
Lambda Active
Mu Active
*Nu Active

Xi Active
Omicron Colony
National Foundation Update
National Standing and Goal Committee
Reports
2019 National Convention

*Chapter did not provide an update

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NOTE: The National Board of Directors have new email addresses due to moving to G
Suite. The new email address can be found under each position’s report.
Atisha Morrison, National Director of Administration
ndoa@ask-wits.com
It has been my distinct honor and privilege to serve as the National Director of Administration
since our time in Washington D.C last July. Since January, many of the women in the new
board positions have blown me away with their passion, service, and new ideas on how to make
this Organization the best for all our members, from Candidates to Alumnae. Veronica Kinn,
National Director of Records, resigned in February and we are thankful for her service to this
organization during her time on the National Board. As we move forward into 2019, we continue
to think about how to recruit women to serve in future regional and current national positions to
provide opportunities to create ethical, successful leaders within our Organization and in STEM.
For many of us, data is a crucial part of our role as a scientist and successful member of the

STEM community. Therefore, beginning in 2020 we will be conducting an Alpha Sigma Kappa-
Women in Technical Studies Census. This will provide the National Board of Directors and the

delegation with information on all our members, their experience within the organization, their
success in STEM, and their hopes for the future of our Organization. The Board hopes to use
this information to guide expansion efforts, discover more philanthropic opportunities, and
improve the experience of our women in our Active chapters. We also hope to build a five-year
Strategic Plan based on these results and findings from 2019 Convention to take us into the
next decade with a clear set of goals and objectives for our Organization.
In addition, we continue to work on our new website, working closely with our committees, and
providing insight to the Exploratory Committee on expanding our national structure. All of us on
the Board encourage feedback from any member within the Organization and want to create
more of an open door policy for all of us working to serve you, our amazing Sisters.
I cannot wait to see you all in Madison in July!
Allison Quiroga, National Director of Expansion
ndoe@ask-wits.com
Sisters,
I know that I say this in every one of my reports to the organization, but it continues to be true:
this is such an exciting time of growth and expansion for our Sisterhood! Since Convention
2018, we have Installed three of our Colonies as Active Chapters: Nu at the University of
Central Florida, Lambda at Depaul University, and Xi at the University of California, Santa
Barbara. In addition, we have welcomed the women of the Omicron Colony at Virginia Tech to
our Sisterhood as well. It has been a wonderful honor and privilege to work with all of these
Sisters on a personal basis, and to watch them grow their local organizations, traditions, and
infrastructure.

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We have received an unprecedented number of initial interest emails over the last year, and as
we continue to gain visibility in our individual communities, and around the country through our
new Colonies and Chapters, I expect this trend of increasing expansion potential will continue.
Working in the capacity of the NDoE has been at once both truly uplifting and truly humbling.
Every day is an opportunity to work with and mentor visionary women who seek to fill a hole in
their communities and make their corner of the world a better place for women entering the
STEM fields. I am honored to be allowed to help further and uphold our values through this
service; and I hope my successor will gain the same satisfaction and bring the same purpose to
this role. I am excited to see what innovations and energy a fresh face could do to bring to the
office of NDoE and how those changes can further our growth and development as a National
Organization.
Renee Layoun, National Director of Finance
ndof@ask-wits.com
Hi Sisters! I’m very excited to serve as your National Director of Finance! I’m a member of the
Epsilon Alumnae Chapter, currently living in Omaha, Nebraska. I’m excited to explore the
financial opportunities of our Organization and combine that with my business background! This
year, my goal is to work with each Finance Chair and provide Chapter finance event materials,
planning, and budgeting tools. By working with Finance Chairs more directly, the goal is to
reach a 90% timeliness for dues and budget submissions. This is an attainable goal with all of
your help and commitment to our Organization both in Sisterhood and financial responsibility.
My Epsilon Sisters know I have two favorite words/phrases: accountability and ballin’ on a
budget. These will be two themes throughout my tenure as National Director of Finance. We
need to remain accountable to each other or else we won’t see progress. We also must make
financially responsible decisions to effectively ball on a budget. With the growth of our Sorority,
we should take a long-term approach for finances too. We must stick to our budgets, pay dues
on time, and challenge the status quo. I’m excited to work with you these next two years, and
please don’t hesitate to reach out with any questions!
Kellee Hartjen, National Director of Operations
ndoo@ask-wits.com
During the first six months that I’ve been the National Director of Operations, I’ve gained so
much more passion and appreciation for all the amazing leaders that make our sorority
incredible. During Chapter Chats with each Active Chapter executive team, I learned so much
about the day to day operations, efforts to improve communities and campuses, and the strong
sisterhood that each Chapter is constantly working on. I can’t express my appreciation enough
for sisters who represent our letters in the best way through socials, community service, study
nights, and sisterhood events.
During the rest of the year, I would like to continue to connect our Chapter together to solve
common problems together. With so many common goals, we also have common struggles. I
hope to be the connection point to share ideas, bylaws, events, and experiences from other

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Chapters to share wisdom. I’m excited for the new website to expedite and create some
autonomy for Chapter leadership!
Thanks for the great start to the year, keep up the hard work and I’ll see you at Convention!
Eva Hanlon, Interim National Director of Records
ndor@ask-wits.com
Greetings sisters! My name is Eva Hanlon, Theta Chapter Founder and I have taken on the
position of Interim National Director of Records. I’m extremely excited to support the board in
any way I can. This position is up for reelection in July at the Convention in Madison, WI. If you
have a passion for ASK, a knack for organization and a flare for project management, this is the
position for you. Please reach out if you have any questions! Good luck to everyone in making
2019 a great year whether that’s academically, professionally or personally!
Chapter Reports
Alpha Active
Chapter health was pretty great this semester. Our exec board strived to make inclusivity and
diversity an important aspect of our training to make sure that our environment remains open
and welcoming to everyone. We were much more prepared for this semester than before
because we knew what to expect. Recruitment went great. We had a good turn out even though
the weather was quite awful. Our VP Recruitment and Operations did an amazing job at finding
new ways to advertise across campus and making sure to keep sisters updated and excited for
recruitment. We had a lot of great events planned for our recruitment and social mixers. Our
philanthropy chair also did a great job of planning many events for sisters to attend. The
sisterhood chair elected for this semester was phenomenal. She did a fantastic job of planning
numerous events with all different types of atmospheres to fit the different interests of our
women. She also used most of her budget and was also able to plan enough events to maintain
our point system.
Beta Active
The Chapter is still struggling to adjust to such a large increase in membership, specifically with
promoting sisterhood bonding and attendance at chapter events, including mandatory events.
Additionally, this semester brought challenging issues the Chapter had previously not
encountered. The biggest of these issues was improper use of social media accounts on behalf
of a few members, which lead to their voluntary deactivation from the chapter. The chapter also
struggled with attendance at Chapter events, both mandatory and optional events. This
culminated in poor attendance for one of the philanthropy events, the Girl Scout Badge
University, which caused organizational issues with the event. To combat these issues, we are
hoping to expand the executive board and incentivize attendance in the next semester.
For the Fall 2018 semester, the recruitment goals of the chapter were to recruit twenty new
members from increasingly varied majors and to initiate all candidates. To reach these goals,
the chapter promoted recruitment at involvement fairs at the beginning of the semester and held
events at locations that were more accessible to students not in the College of Engineering.

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Most of these events were held in locations that were as close to the freshman dormitories as
possible to make attending events as convenient as possible for potential new members.
Our scholarship committee held 145.75 cumulative study hours during the Fall 2018
semester. Through these hours, a limited number of snapchat hours, or university tutors, the
active chapter logged 416.65 study hours this semester. The scholarship committee created
and kept a point system to award the sister with the most study hours a goodie basket at the
end of the semester and put everybody else into a drawing for a second goodie basket based
on attendance.
Beta Alumnae
We’re still working on our communication but have at least had both of our scheduled Fall and
Spring meetings this past year. Fall meeting was held with 4 sisters online (all four executive
officers). Officer elections were held online with only two dues paying members voting and two
associate members providing additional responses.
Epsilon Active
This semester, we had 32 members with the addition of 17 members in the initiation of the
Alpha Zeta class. At the beginning of the semester, we had 17 sisters voluntarily inactive, a
number much higher than we’ve had in the recent past. This was likely due to uncertainty going
into the semester because we did not have a President at the time. Despite anxieties, the
Chapter stabilized well following the election of a new President. The President, with support
from the Executive Team, made mental health a priority this semester and it was a frequent
central theme in different Chapter events. We think this initiative was well-received by the
members of the Chapter and expect it will continue to be a priority in this organization. The
Chapter had some difficulties this semester filling all our positions. Doc Revision has been
revisiting Bylaws to investigate whether duplicate efforts across multiple positions, or, in
contrast, too many responsibilities delegated to a single position could be the cause of these
difficulties. Toward the end of the semester, we welcomed a newly elected Executive Team
formed of predominantly younger members. We are excited to see where their enthusiasm and
new ideas may lead the Chapter in the future. Finally, we said goodbye to 10 sisters as they
transitioned from the Active to the Alum Chapter.
Epsilon Alumnae
We currently have 13 professional members, which is a little lower than normal for us. However,
there are some recent alumnae that would like to be professional in the future and have asked
us to keep in contact with them. There was also low participation in our fall meeting, but we
believe that was due to it not being around any other big event. In the future we plan to vote on
the date of the meeting once the Active Chapter has their dates set and include the weekend of
Initiation in our potential dates for the meeting in hopes to have more participation.
Zeta Active
Overall the chapter is doing very well. We were able to more than
double our membership this past semester. Cotton candy and card making were our most
successful events. Card making during our recruitment event was for a charity that

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delivers cards to children in the hospital. Socials were more informal this semester. Several
sisters would go out together or do things together. We are looking forward to continued growth
in the next couple of semesters
Zeta Alumnae
The Chapter has been doing well. We have noticed a plateau in the amount of alums attending
larger social events. We are considering ideas for different types of events to promote alum
participation. Some alums have expressed interest in more professional-based events, so we
would like to try hosting a networking and/or professional development event this year. We are
also considering ideas for improving Active/Alum relations (i.e. Active/Alum E-board meetings,
professional development event, etc.). The Alum Chapter’s relationship with the Active Chapter
has been doing well. Alums stepped up to be big sisters to the new sisters of the Active Chapter
when there were not enough Active sisters to be Bigs for the fall semester.
Eta Active
The semester started out really well; 6 of our 8 candidates initiated at the end of the fall, and 3
sisters went inactive, leaving us with 17 actives. Also, recruitment really well this semester. All
members were helping and super encouraging during the whole process. We had 6 new
members that initiated, they were so helpful and active in all our events throughout the
semester. None of our sisters went alum or inactive, so we should be starting next semester
with 20 active sisters. This is super exciting, because we are in rebuilding process, so events
and socials should be more promising since more girls will be there and get out name out
around campus. We really hope to recruit at least 3-4 women in the next semester that many
girls and also teach more leadership positions to the active members.
The Executive Board got really close with some EC retreats, and it was the first semester in a
year to have a full EC, so it was great for everyone to have a little responsibility and to have
more voices being heard in the decision process. Sisters and candidates feel more comfortable
because we made such a huge effort to make sure everyone was happy with the sisterhood. I
think we have done a lot of excellent work this semester and year that will benefit the Eta
Chapter’s in years to come.

Theta Active
We lost almost half of our chapter’s active members last semester due to everyone graduating
which has produced a lot of growth and improvements in chapter health. Due to the great loss of
people, rebuilding chapter health and sisterhood was a major goal this past semester. I feel like
we made a lot of great steps this semester in the right direction. Sisters are building those
sisterhood bonds both inside and outside of Chapter. The newly recruited candidate class is the
most bonded group of women I have ever been exposed to in Alpha Sigma Kappa. The overall
atmosphere this past semester has been greatly improved and reflects positively on this
organization. The whole officer team is responsible for these positive changes by exercising
transparency, leadership, and upholding our values.
Overall the semester has gone really well. I feel like we have met our goals as far as chapter

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development goes. Sisterhood was our main focus this semester which I feel was met and built
upon. We had a lot more attendance at our social events and most officers incorporated a
sisterhood component in their events. I recently made a survey asking women how they felt on
how we were doing on building sisterhood and most women said it has been dramatically
improved this semester. Discussions this year has also been drastically improved and has
created a more safe and friendly environment when having large discussions. In addition,
having random seating assignments in chapter has improved sisterhood and has reduced the
amount of clicks in the chapter.

Iota Active
The Chapter is overall doing well and is improving internal bonding and growth. We are working
through the loss of Eboard members. But overall chapter health is going very well and we are
communication better that we ever have. Chapter involvement is at all time high. In order to
raise money for Donors Choose projects, classrooms in the West Haven area. We collected
money at tables which were held for several weeks throughout the semester in Bartels. These
tables were relatively successful, and we will be improving them for better results next
semester. We also hosted a campus wide event to raise money for Donors Choose. We did
raise some good money were just trying to figure out with are very restricted school account
how to donate it.
Lambda Active
Colony Health has done nothing but improved over this past quarter. While bringing on 7 new
candidates and preparing for our Installation Ceremony has been stressful, all of our members
have grown closer than ever over our continuous progress. All members maintain their
involvement in forming a strong foundation to our colony and are more than excited to be
moving quickly towards becoming a chapter. We continue to use the motto handed down to us
by our Expansion Representative Ali which is, “When in doubt put sisterhood first”. By keeping
this saying a part of every event, meeting, and celebration we have been able to maintain and
strengthen the health of the colony.
Mu Active
We have grown substantially this past semester with our largest rush class last Spring. Due to
the large growth and our historically low rush rates during the fall semester, we decided to focus
on growing connections between current sisters and focus on a large rush in the Spring. We
hoped this added time would enable us to not only host more info sessions and create more
interest, as well as allowing our rapidly growing chapter time to bond and solidify our identity as
sisters before introducing potential new members. Our Spring rush is scheduled for the first
week in February (4th -10th) with information sessions to be held on the 3rd and January 27th.
We are very excited about our rush theme: “Join our Pride” and have planned both events that
were successful during our rush last Spring, including Hot-Seat-Hot Chocolate and a Gottwald
Scavenger hunt with fun activities like pipette shot! Our chapter had a great time volunteering at
our second VCU Girls in Math Day, reaching over 40 girls over three sessions with our activity
“Tic-Tac-Woa,” which we lead with Dr. Heather Russell. We also held our first fundraiser, selling
50mL Christmas beakers and made over $250. We will be using a portion of this to fund

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scholarships for Mu actives that need financial assistance in order to participate in ASK and will
also be donating a portion to a Donor’s choose STEM project in the Spring. Finally, we
successfully executed our first formal this year. Shoutout to our amazing social chair Natalie
Melton for finding the perfect venue. Everyone had a great time and it was exciting to see all of
our active sisters in attendance!
Xi Active
This quarter, we continued to grow during our second formal recruitment and make
improvements in a variety of areas. Unfortunately, this was the first quarter some sisters chose
to discontinue their membership as they found themselves busy with other commitments.
However, we have been focusing on strengthening our bonds by increasing the number of
sisterhood events we hold and creating more traditions. We also picked local charity to be
involved with for future quarters, Girls Inc. Girls Inc provides support for underprivileged
elementary aged girls to succeed in school. They also focus on advocating for women in STEM
and leadership roles. We hope to start volunteering by helping girls with their homework on a
weekly basis starting Winter Quarter. We wrote a new Sisterhood Attendance Policy to make
sure everyone is contributing equally to fundraising and volunteering efforts while attending
events that are vital to chapter health. This will go into effect Winter Quarter.
Omicron Colony
Omicron Colony at Virginia Tech is doing very well! They just completed their first recruitment,
taking in 16 girls for their Alpha Class, thus doubling in size. A Constitution Committee has been
created and they are in the beginning stages of drafting a constitution and bylaws. We are
hoping to schedule some candidate education video chats for later in the semester. The girls
are looking forward to doing so bonding events including their new Alpha Class so they can get
to know them better before their Candidate Ceremony in April. Overall, Omicron is progressing
very well paperwork wise, while still taking time for sisterhood bonding activities.
National Foundation Update
As announced in January, the essay topic for the 2019 ASK National Scholarship is
“Promoting women in technical fields.” Essays are due May 1st by 11:59pm Central
time. Please submit your scholarship essay using the Scholarship tab
at www.askwits.com/scholarships/.
Note: This scholarship is open to ASK active student members only – must be active by
scholarship deadline and in the 2019 fall semester. Our website www.askwits.org has
undergone and is currently undergoing updates. Please bear with us during the
construction period. Please let us know if you have any comments. Also, please like us
on Facebook for more up-to-date information.
Our annual meeting will be held Saturday, July 27, 2019 in Madison, Wisconsin. The
time will be announced soon. A conference call line will be available for all to join. Only
professional alum members carry a vote. Elections will be held for the following
positions: Treasurer and one Advisory Board Member (National Scholarship Co-Chair).

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Please send questions and nominations to ask.educational.foundation@gmail.com by
July 1, 2019. Note: you must be a professional alum member to hold a position.

National Standing and Goal Committee Reports
Exploratory Committee
This committee was formed to based on the needs of the National organization and the board to
address the hierarchy/structure of Alpha Sigma Kappa and the breakdown in effectiveness and
efficiency. The project was undertaken by committee members on a volunteer basis to
determine the strengths and weaknesses of the current structure and evaluate the best
approach to future growth based on the organization’s goals.
Our goal is to
• finalize the regional director position and consult the board of directors
● write a proposal to beta test an individual as a regional director to determine if we can
write it into our governing documents
● because of the above item, we need to propose that our 2020 convention is a
constitutional convention
● finalize a working document for the continuous learning program
○ this is more of a SOP of guidelines to follow for success
○ this document may not be brought to convention formalized as it may need to be
expanded and evaluated on a working basis

Membership Development Committee
Originally this group was found to make sure that all women knew the same information. During
research into it, it was found that not all chapters are receiving the same New Member
Education. Or at least not everyone remembers key information from the education. To help
with this, we plan to make documents to make education the same across all Chapters. The
PowerPoints are on schedule to be finished by the next National Convention. These will include
all of the information that is necessary for New Members as well as Current Members to
understand the organization as a whole. After these are finished, contact with the Active
Chapters will be initiated to determine what else they would deem helpful in the New Member
Education.

Newsletter Committee

It became evident while editing the Wikipedia page that the Organization could use a reference-
able way to track the achievements of our Organization. Additionally, the new NDOO wanted a

way to improve communication to all Chapters and Sisters of the National Organization. A
National Newsletter ( News and Views) has existed in the past, in the 90s and from 2008-
2012, with variable success. The current committee was proposed at the 2018 National

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Convention in Washington, DC. The Committee has agreed to start with a biannual distribution
through Chapters and work towards quarterly distribution, with increased content, as newsletter
communication becomes commonplace within the Organization. The Committee will check in
annually to determine the frequency of distribution and whether the distribution format should be
re-evaluated.

Closed Goal Committee
We have completed the review of the Initiation Ceremony. We will be tackling the Candidate
Ceremony in April. If we get to it, we will be developing a tracker that we will be proposing to
have updated during closed meeting every year after it is approved. This tracker will track by
Chapter – their traditions, frequency, importance, etc. Our thought is this will prevent anything
from getting lost if a Chapter has to be rebuilt. The tracker could also be made available –
delegation approval dependent – to new Colonies so they can see what others are doing.

2019 Convention Update
National Convention Registration is open.
Convention is in Madison, WI . July 26– July 28, 2019. Late registration begins May 15 and fees
are $30 for both Actives and Alumna. Registration closes on June 15, 2019.