"Go Big or Go Home" - Alpha Pi Sigma

Charityn Fernandez
Alpha Pi Sigma Sorority, Inc.

After the disappointing losing score of 27-14 against the TCU Frogs, last week’s Homecoming football game didn’t end as gloomy for the United Sorority and Fraternity Council (USFC) winners of the Carlson Cup for best organization of the year 2011, Alpha Pi Sigma. In second and third place came the ladies of Sigma Lambda Gamma and Lambda Theta Alpha.

The Carlson Cup is an award granted to the most excelling Greek organizations on campus.  Throughout the year, points are accumulated as organizations complete community service, embrace deep sisterhood and/or brotherhood, strive for and maintain a high GPA, Greek pairing, consistent participation in on-campus activities, and extracurricular involvement on top of being Greek.  All these points are earned through the judging of a binder that each organization turns in at the end of each academic year.  This binder is called the Standards  Of Excellence binder.  The three organizations mentioned previously were the strongest candidates to represent the Standards of Exellence in USFC for the 2011 award. Unfortunately, only one group earned the big prize. 

The ladies of Alpha Pi Sigma cheered and chanted as they were announced as the winners.  Member Bianca Morales says: "Alumnae were proud to to be a part of this moment, especially founders.  This reignited their passion for Alpha Pi Sigma.  We are living the vision of our founders."

Not only did these ladies take pride in their accomplishment this night, but they have been the only organization to win the Carlson Cup more than two times in a row since 1999.  In fact, Alpha Pi Sigma has won the Carlson Cup nine out of 13 times. 

How have these ladies achieved this accomplishment?  Alpha Pi Sigma was the first Latina-based organization to be established at San Diego State University.  Since the day of their founding on March 10, 1990, they have embraced their values of serving their surrounding community through numerous hours of volunteer work.  They live the life of classy ladies and focus on enhancing the academic, personal and professional growth of their members.  Most importantly, what highlights the achievements for this organization is the strong sisterhood foundation that holds this sorority together.  The ladies say to be assets of each other because without that sisterly environment, their achievements would not be possible.

Member of the sorority, Diana Galvan says, “ We Alphas are an outstanding organization because we lead by example, and we earn rather than request.”  We hope the victories continue for these ladies because it is groups like this that represent the real definition of being Greek.

Charityn is a junior studying journalism and Spanish.  You may contact her at charityn-fernandez@hotmail.com.