Delta Sigma Pi hosts a professional business trip each semester to a city voted on by the Fraternity. This semester it was St. Louis.

Thursday, October 24th was the day we departed from Iowa. Carpools of 4 people per car are arranged and leave at various times throughout the day. My Car was set to depart at 3:00 pm, we ended up leaving Iowa City around 5:30 pm because some of us forgot to pack.

Once we were underway, we began the small talk, I was in a car of 3 juniors and I was the only pledge in the car. It was a great experience as I got to know people who I had spoken to before but not an extensive amount, we talked about internships as one of the juniors had recently got an internship opportunity in Chicago.

In total we were driving for 4 hours and 30 minutes but stopped a couple times along the way for snacks, bathroom breaks, and gas, we ended up arriving at our hotel, Red Lion at around 11:00 pm. Checking took about 20 minutes, upon going up to my room I found the whole pledge class in my living room area which was a surprise and everyone cheered upon my arrival. We spent a couple hours in my room watching television and playing games to get to know each other better.
The next morning, we all woke up bright and early to visit the companies. Everyone majoring in Finance, Accounting, Economics, and BAIS went to St. Louis Regional Chamber of Commerce, which is where I went. They spoke to us about the opportunities they had for internships and about their day to day operations.

After that, we split up from our big group to get breakfast and explore the city. My small group went and had breakfast at a local Mexican restaurant and after quickly changing out of our professional clothes we went to visit the world-famous St. Louis Arch.

Shortly after the visit to the St. Louis Arch, we went to have dinner with everyone in the fraternity at a buffet-style restaurant, concluding our professional trip to St. Louis. The next morning, we left around 11:00 am to drive those 5 grudging hours back to Iowa City.

Rushing a fraternity is not something I had planned on doing in college. As a matter of fact, I didn’t even know what rushing meant. (Rushing means to try to join a fraternity or sorority.)

I began to become interested in joining a business fraternity when I attended Tippie Fest, an event organized to connect new students with clubs and organizations in the Tippie college of business. There were multiple tables set up with students eager to recruit students for their organizations. At Iowa there are a total of three business fraternities, Phi Gamma Nu, Alpha Kappa Psi and Delta Sigma Pi. Phi Gamma Nu is the newest fraternity, they are also the smallest. This fraternity is a little different when compared to Delta Sigma Pi or Alpha Kappa Psi because its open to all majors not just business students, which has its advantages and disadvantages. The advantage is that you can meet people of all majors and not just business students; the disadvantage being that you won’t have as many connections in Tippie, which makes group studying in business classes a little harder. Alpha Kappa Psi is the largest business fraternity, this fraternity is only open for business majors and minors. Their core values are brotherhood, integrity, knowledge, and service. They often host community events with other student organizations.

Delta Sigma Pi is a close second in size to Alpha Kappa Psi and is also the business fraternity that I ended up joining! They are very involved on campus: they have a private career fair, they do more than one theme of philanthropies, and they have executive positions with semester long terms to provide many people the opportunity to be in a leadership role.

All three groups are co-ed and very different from a social fraternity. All groups are great for professionalism and networking. I would highly recommend rushing the one you like; the best way to find the best fit is by going to socials hosted during recruitment and just finding the people you find you get along with most. For me that was Delta Sigma Pi, their values of diversity, service and philanthropy hit close to home – and a lot of my friends were also rushing which made the whole process more fun.

Moving from Chicago to Iowa City was a tough choice. Chicago is my city. Chicago is home. But I committed to The University of Iowa for the following reasons in no particular order.

1. The University of Iowa is integrated into the Iowa City. Many rural/suburban colleges I visited didn’t have much to do outside of the college. Iowa City has a variety of things to do including a wide selection of restaurants and many events, such as parades. Within the first week of me being at Iowa there was a parade that was representative of my culture- the Iowa City Latino Festival.
2. Becoming healthier and more active has always been a goal of mine. At the University of Iowa you are given many tools and resources. Some of the resources that I have already made use of are the Campus Recreation & Wellness Center, which has all the classes and amenities you could ever want. They have pools, weights, you name it, as well as making an appointment with a nutritionist through Student Wellness.
3. Being able to study with friends has always been something that has helped me be successful in school. When I learned that they had a Business Living Learning Community, I knew I had to apply. The University of Iowa has 15 different living learning communities each with different themes ranging from major-related to identity related.