Coronavirus Update

Our primary priorities for college members are for you to keep yourselves healthy (both physically and mentally), transition to remote learning which we know is a major source of stress, and to maintain your sense of sisterhood. However, we know there some essential business that cannot wait. We’ve granted blanket approval for college chapters to be able to operate virtually and during times that work for them. Essential chapter business may include things like: 

• Changing bylaws, 
• Voting on inactivity, 
• Handling member discipline issues, 
• Voting on an officer appointment/re-slate, 
• Paying vendors, 
• Processing payroll.

If your chapter has new members to initiate—whether or not your school has imposed restrictions on meetings—please contact Madison Cannon, assistant director of collegiate services.

Chapters may prorate new member dues for the end of this semester or quarter. Please contact your budget district director or Theta staff if your chapter needs help with calculating a prorated amount. New members who cannot be initiated this spring should not be charged an initiation fee.  

UPDATE: If new members have already paid their initiation fees, you can decide to refund them now and re-bill in the fall, or simply carry over until the fall. New members will not also be charged a per capita fee in the fall.  New member dues for this term should not be cancelled completely. If your chapter votes to prorate/refund dues, this applies to new members as well. If you have questions regarding how your new members or recently initiated members should be billed, please reach out to your budget district director.

This will depend on how much and what business your chapter still needs to conduct. Votes may be most easily conducted via email, Survey Monkey, Google Forms, etc. Conversely, discussions might be better accomplished via web conference. Work with your chapter advisors and college district director to determine the best option for your chapter if activities and meetings are cancelled.

There are several online platforms that allow large groups to meet. Chapters have had success with Zoom, Vimeo, Twitch, and Microsoft Teams. While all platforms seem to offer a free base-level experience, you may need to upgrade if you anticipate having more than 100 participants or are meeting for a longer period of time. Your campus may also provide some free resources for online gatherings.

If FHC has closed your specific house, chapter members will receive a prorated refund of usage, room, board and out-of-house board payments. For schools on a semester system, the April invoice for housing fees will be canceled. For schools on the quarter system, the spring quarter invoice will be canceled. 

If a member traveled or is traveling to a country with a Level 2 or 3 travel advisory, she will be required to self-quarantine for 14 days at a location that is not the Theta house. In accordance with recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), she cannot return to the Theta house until the 14-day self-quarantine has expired.

FHC is working individually with each chapter to determine if the house should remain open. Please work with your property manager for FHC-managed properties if you’d like to keep the house open for spring break. If your house is managed by a facility corporation board (FCB), please work with your advisors and FCB to determine if the house can remain open. In all cases, the facility director will need to remain on site, and the facility rules would still be in effect. Food service will not take place during the spring break week.

Kappa Alpha Theta Fraternity Housing Corporation (FHC) will follow directives from the University regarding closing the facility. In most cases, if the University is closing, they are allowing students with extenuating circumstances to submit a form to remain in University housing. We recommend our members utilize the University process if they have an extenuating circumstance.

If the facility remains open, we will continue food service as scheduled. We would recommend that members eat in shifts so that not more than 10 members are gathered in the dining room at a time. 

Clean chapter facilities are very important to Theta! We have regularly scheduled cleaning service for each facility throughout the week and will continue these practices. FHC will also have housekeeping staff sanitize and clean common areas of the chapter facility during spring break. We encourage chapters that aren’t a part of FHC to ensure their cleaning staff comes in over spring break.

We are optimistic that Grand Convention, scheduled for July 8-12, will take place as planned. Should circumstances change, those who are registered for Grand Convention will be notified. Information about Grand Convention will also continue to be available on the Grand Convention website.

This feels like an extraordinary time, and your family, your Theta sisters, or yourself may need help coping with ongoing uncertainty as campuses and communities take steps to prevent the further spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19). This blog provides several resources to navigate your emotional wellness during this time. Active Minds is also providing webinars and live chats (registration required).

Here are more resources for you:

• Webinars hosted by Talk One-2-One
• Caring for the Elderly During COVID-19 (Talk One-2-One resource)
• What to Do If You Are Sick with Coronavirus (CDC resource)
• Stop the Spread of Germs (CDC resource)
• Stay Calm and Reduce Fear (coronavirus.gov resource)
• Helping Children Cope with Uncertainty (Talk One-2-One resource)
• Navigating Through Personal Finances with COVID-19 (Talk One-2-One resource)
• Free Resources on Calm
• Love is Louder

If your event must be cancelled altogether, we recommend contacting your donors/supporters asking if they would be willing to allow your chapter to give their donations/ticket sales/apparel purchases/etc. directly to the charity.

If you can postpone your event instead of cancelling it, contact your donors/supporters to let them know that the event is postponed because of COVID-19 concerns. If you cannot establish a definite future date for the event, let your donors/supporters know that you’ll be in touch when you have rescheduled.

Consider pivoting the campaign by organizing an online fundraiser for the charitable organization. See the next question for ideas on how to still host an online fundraiser. You may also contact philanthropy@kappaalphatheta.org for more information.

Here are some options to consider:

• Personal Page Competition. Each member creates a personal fundraising page within the general fundraiser website. Ask every chapter member to create a personal page and share it with at least five family members or friends not from campus. One group increased the amount they raised from $8,000 to $40,000 this way!

• Chapter Challenge. Chapters have been incredibly successful running a chapter challenge competition in CrowdChange. A chapter challenge involves asking every chapter on campus to create its own team fundraising page for a specific philanthropy. Team pages are ordered in a leaderboard format to spark friendly competition. Optional: offer a prize to the chapter who raises the most.

If an event a chapter has budgeted for must be cancelled, it’s possible the chapter will have excess funds at the end of the year. Fraternity staff is currently revising the year-end discretionary form to increase the discretionary portion chapters are allowed to retain for the year ending June 30, 2020. This will allow for excess funds to be used for an activity in the fall. Chapters within FHC's Facility Management Program (FMP) do not have a surplus calculation and will continue to be able to retain ALL funds they have at year-end.

If a chapter would like to refund a portion of dues in lieu of retaining excess funds, they have the option of voting to refund a prorated portion of chapter dues for this academic year. Chapters are encouraged to vote on this refund and issue this refund only after all member payments have been made. Please ask that your members continue to keep their Billhighway accounts current. Theta staff is currently working with Billhighway on steps needed to process refunds for those chapters that choose this option. More information will be available in the coming weeks. 

UPDATE: We are working with Billhighway to provide the easiest way for your chapter to accomplish prorating and refunding, if you feel it is warranted.  Within the next few days, you will receive Billhighway instructions to assist you in how to cancel fees or issue credits to refund a portion to those that have paid in full. We continue to advise, but not require, that your chapter wait until May or June to create refunds, if any. Your chapter may still be receiving invoices for past expenses or ongoing expenses that need to be paid. You may also still be required to pay for facility utilities and wages, even if your facility is closed. It is important that you continue to pay invoices in a timely manner. And as we mentioned in our last communication, remember that your chapter will likely incur expenses in the fall before fall dues are paid.

A message was sent to all chapter chief financial officers on March 18, and the PDF is provided here.