FORWARD
For years, brothers of SAE have rallied around the spirit of service and volunteerism for their communities in one of the most recognized service initiatives known as the True Gentleman Day of Service. Successful TG Days of Service can be some of the most memorable moments of your chapter’s year and can lead to years of tradition and enjoyment. Ultimately, TG Days of Service are a way to give back to your community and make a lasting impact in the lives of brothers and others.
MISSION
To engage chapters and their community in the spirit of service and volunteerism.
HISTORY
The True Gentleman Day of Service began in 2004. For many years, Sigma Alpha Epsilon hosted a realm-wide day/ weekend of service in conjunction with the National Youth Service Day, which is typically at the end of April. All collegiate chapters and alumni associations were encouraged to plan or participate in community service at some point over that weekend and registered their event with the Fraternity Service Center in order to officially brand it as a TG Day of Service. Then during the event, chapters and alumni associations were encouraged to take a few pictures and have fun! After the event, they sent a brief write-up about the day and a few pictures that captured their experience to the Fraternity Service Center to be featured in the next issue of The Record.
To give collegiate chapters and alumni associations more flexibility, there is no longer one set date for a TG Day of Service. Collegiate chapters and alumni associations are encouraged to host and participate in community service projects year-round and to use the True Gentleman Day of Service branding for all their service initiatives. This allows you to have a TG Day of Service at any time throughout the year and at the best time for your group or community partner.
TODAY: WHAT TG DAY OF SERVICE HAS BECOME
As Paddy Murphy has become known throughout the realm and on college campuses for raising funds to benefit philanthropic organizations, the modern-day goal for the True Gentleman Days of Service is to be known in the same way for community service and volunteering. During the 165th Anniversary Convention, the Supreme Council set a goal that by 2025, the Fraternity would complete at least 1,000,000 community service hours. To support this initiative, the Fraternity has put together this resource to help chapters in their respective efforts to help all members complete their minimum of 20 hours or more of community service each year.
NMDP provides ground-breaking research, innovative technologies, patient support, and education that save lives. Over the past 30 years, they have managed the most diverse marrow registry in the world. They work every day to save lives through blood stem transplants and therapies.
Sleep in Heavenly Peace (SHP) believes all children deserve a safe, comfortable place to lay their heads. Across the U.S., too many boys and girls go without a bed - or even a pillow - to sleep on. These children end up sleeping on couches, blankets, and even floors. This can affect their happiness and health.
Although a chapter is free to assist any cause of its choosing, including allocating volunteering with local service organizations, we encourage you to consider holding an event benefiting one of our four National Service/Philanthropic partners. We also encourage you to include a TG Day of Service as a part of Paddy Murphy.
Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals (CMN Hospitals) is the largest network of children’s hospitals in the United States and Canada and partners with leading providers of pediatric healthcare with a mission of helping as many kids as possible live better, healthier lives.
Movember focuses on three important men’s health issues: mental health and suicide prevention, prostate cancer, and testicular cancer. Men are dying on average six years earlier than women and from largely preventable reasons. Movember is on a mission to change this.
Visit www.sae.net/service-philanthropy/ to learn more about how to support each organization.
WHAT IS A TG DAY OF SERVICE?
A True Gentleman Day of Service is any service project or event held by a group of SAEs. Collegiate chapters and emerging chapters, alumni associations, or any group of members may choose to organize a TG Day of Service. Groups are encouraged to hold multiple TG Days of Service throughout the year and are welcome to hold them at any time.
Sigma Alpha Epsilon values service to others and our global community, as conveyed through our mission and vision. What better way to live our values than a True Gentleman Day of Service - serving your community with your brothers?
ELEMENTS OF A TG DAY OF SERVICE
1. Select a cause or organization to work with (page 6-7).
2. Review the service best practices (page 8-9) to ensure brothers get the most out of their service experience.
3. Track member involvement and impact (page 9).
4. Engage brothers via social media (page 10).
5. Submit the Service & Philanthropy Reporting Form (more on page 10).
HOW TO PICK A PROJECT
• Consider working with one of SAE’s service/philanthropy partners to develop a project your members can participate in together to benefit the organization.
• For example, you may have a local Children’s Miracle Network Hospital where brothers can visit to read books to the children.
• Partner with a local organization your group has a relationship with or connection to.
• For example, if your brothers are passionate about food insecurity, you may partner with a local food bank and spend the day stocking shelves, packaging foods, or cleaning their facility.
• You may participate as a group in a campus-wide service project that is already being organized by your university or local community.
• For example, have your whole chapter sign up to volunteer at your school’s Spring Day of Service. Or your alumni group may sign up as individuals for the same Habitat for Humanity build.
• For more ideas, see the next section.
SERVICE IDEAS
This section includes ideas for a variety of service projects and events. This is not an exhaustive list, rather is meant to provide some basic ideas and can be adapted to meet your specific needs, interests, and resources.
ONE DAY/WEEKEND
• Clean up a local playground, park, street, or beach.
• Deliver meals to the elderly or homeless.
• Hold a children’s storytime in conjunction with a local library, elementary school, etc.
• Hold an educational seminar for teens on important issues such as violence, drugs, fitness, etc.
• Hold a seasonally appropriate activity for children at a local school or children’s home (safe trick or treating, Easter egg hunt, carnival, etc.)
• Assist or visit children at a hospital or school for the blind, deaf, or developmentally disabled.
• Organize a field day or sporting event to get children exercising.
• Volunteer at a local food bank stocking shelves, packaging foods, or cleaning their facility.
• Volunteer at a local animal shelter.
LONG TERM
• Coach or sponsor a youth athletic team (as permitted by your university and risk management plans).
• Create or volunteer at an after-school program for local children where they can get help with their studies or learn a new activity.
• Collect diapers, toys, or other baby essentials for needy families.
• Sponsor a toy drive for a local organization or youth charity.
• Make blankets, stuffed animals, etc., for seriously ill or needy children.
• Help to provide leadership for a youth organization such as Scouting, 4-H, Campfire, etc.
• Collect food and funds and provide assistance for local food pantries and soup kitchens.
• Sponsor a book drive for a local library, school, or community center.
• Help with child-care services at a shelter or daycare center.
• Record books for blind children.
• Raise money for an organization that serves youth through walk-a-thons, rock-a-thons, etc.
• Hold an adoption event or pet supply drive for a local animal shelter.
• Visit the elderly at a local retirement home or become pen pals with isolated residents.
• Collect school supplies for a local school, Boys and Girls Club, YMCA, etc.
• Collect hygiene products for a local homeless shelter.
NMDP
• Host a community event to get all the fraternity and sorority members on your campus swabbed and to join the registry.
• Table in a high-traffic area on campus to educate your community about NMDP and allow them to get swabbed and join the registry.
• Partner with a professor - a professor might be willing to offer extra credit to their class to join the registry or may allow you to come in and present to their class about NMDP.
• Table at your school’s dance marathon - provide education and swab students to join the registry.
SERVICE IDEAS
CHILDREN’S MIRACLE NETWORK HOSPITALS
• Visit your local Children’s Miracle Network Hospital to read books or bring toys to the sick children.
• Trick or treating at the hospital - set up a fun activity like backwards trick-or-treating, where your bring candy to each of the kids’ rooms at your local CMN Hospital.
• Hold a toy drive to gather gifts for the kids at your local CMN Hospital.
MOVEMBER
• Host an educational event on men’s health for male students, staff, or faculty or with a local men’s organization, like a shelter or YMCA (utilize Movember resources).
SLEEP IN HEAVENLY PEACE
• Hold a bed-building event or delivery day with your local Sleep In Heavenly Peace chapter.
• Host a recruitment event at an SHP build day.
• Host a brotherhood event at an SHP build day.
• Host an alcohol-free social event with another sorority or fraternity at an SHP build day.
• Hold a holiday gift drive to collect bedding materials (pillows, sheets, comforters, etc.)
• Create an Amazon wish list or registry to let your brothers and community members know what bedding items to buy.
LOCAL ORGANIZATIONS
• Participate as a group in a campus-wide service project that is already being organized by your university or local community.
• Do a joint service project with another fraternity, sorority, or service-based student organization.
• Hold a career/college fair at a local high school.
• Develop or staff an event for a youth-related organization, such as Ronald McDonald House, Big Brothers/Big Sisters, Boys/Girls Clubs, YMCA, child abuse centers, etc.
• Do a joint service project with a high school service club such as the JROTC, Key Club, etc.
• Volunteer to help at a Special Olympics event.
• Hold an educational event with a local charity you support focused on the cause they address.
SERVICE BEST PRACTICES
This tool is intended to help you prepare your chapter for a meaningful TG Day of Service. Please use it to guide the conversation with your brothers and your chapter’s interactions with the community you serve.
BEFORE
Research the service organization.
• What community are they located in?
• What does the organization focus on?
DURING
Remember...
• …that you are a guest in someone else’s space.
• [The True Gentleman is the man whose conduct proceeds from goodwill and an acute sense of propriety]
• …that the community members are experts on their own lives.
• [Who does not make the poor man conscious of his poverty, the obscure man of his obscurity, or any man of his inferiority or deformity]
• …that you are not a savior coming in to help.
• [who thinks of the rights and feelings of others, rather than his own]; maybe [and who appears well in any company, a man with whom honor is sacred and virtue safe.]
• …to keep an open mind.
• [who is himself humbled if necessity compels him to humble another]
Ask questions. Ask yourself.
• Is your experience different than expected? Does anything you hear, feel, or smell surprise you?
• What did the body language of the community members tell you?
• What would a typical day be like for the community members who use the services at the organization? If you were one of them, what would you think of you coming in and serving?
• If you were one of the community members, what would your self-concept be like?
• What would you change about this agency if you were in charge?
• How can you put their rights and feelings above your own?
• How can you be sincere in this environment?
• How can you connect genuinely with the community members without making them more conscious of their situation?
AFTER Reflect
• What did you do?
• How do you feel after the experience?
• Did you personally interact with any community members? How was that?
• How are you different now compared to before the service? Have any values, beliefs, or opinions changed? If so, what and why? Do you have a different picture of the community than you had before?
• What impacted the way you saw this experience? What lens were you viewing from?
• If the community members seem different from you, how? If you have any particular stereotypes about the population you worked with, have these stereotypes changed during your service? In what ways?
• What are some of the pressing needs/issues in the community? What do you think are the root causes of these issues? Does this service address those needs? How, specifically, has the community benefited?
• What other work is happening to address this issue? What should others do about this issue?
• Where do we go from here? How can you collaborate with others? What’s the next step?
• How does this service align with being a True Gentleman?
Continue
• Stay in contact with the organization.
• Follow through and see if your service is making a difference.
• Provide recurring service for the organization and/or its community members.
REPORT
• Submit the Service & Philanthropy Reporting Form to tell us about your project’s impact (more on this later).
TRACK INVOLVEMENT AND IMPACT
During your TG Day of Service, there are some things you will want to make note of. These items are listed below and outlined in the TG Day of Service Printout, which can be found in the Appendix of this guide.
ITEMS TO KEEP TRACK OF DURING YOUR EVENT:
• Service Organization
• Date
• Location
• Start Time
• End Time
• Number of brothers in attendance
• Any other student organizations or groups you partnered with
• List the project(s) your members took part in throughout the day
• Take a few good photos so you can post about the event later
After your event, you can tally up the total number of service hours by figuring out how many service hours each brother completed and adding those up. If everyone arrives and leaves at the same time, that number will be simpler to calculate. For example, if fifteen (15) brothers completed two (2) service hours each, your event total is thirty (30) service hours.
Encourage brothers to wear letters to your TG Day of Service, and don’t forget to take pictures at your event. You will want to post these on your chapter social media accounts, personal social media accounts, and in the Service & Philanthropy Reporting Form
SOCIAL MEDIA ENGAGEMENT
• Always post about your TG Day of Service from your chapter’s social media accounts. Encourage individuals to post on their accounts, too.
• Use the hashtag #TGDayofService every time you post.
• Use the hashtag #NationalVolunteerMonth anytime you hold a TG Day of Service in the month of April.
• Tag the national SAE accounts:
• Instagram: @sigmaalphaepsilon
• Twitter: @sae1856
• Facebook: @saefraternity
• LinkedIn: Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity
REPORT YOUR SUCCESS
After your event, submit the Service & Philanthropy Reporting Form to report your involvement to the Fraternity Service Center. You will need the following information to complete the form:
• Date of event
• Service organization/beneficiary of your service
• Other organizations partnered with, if applicable (i.e. another fraternity, club, or office)
• Number of brothers in attendance
• Number of non-members in attendance, if applicable
• Total number of community service hours (5 brothers who each did 3 hours of service equals 15 hours total)
• Brief description of event
• Any photos you took at the event
TG DAY OF SERVICE PRINTOUT
Print this form and bring it with you to your TG Day of Service to help you keep track of all the important information. Make sure to take a few photos and encourage brothers to use #TGDayofService. You will use this information to complete the Service & Philanthropy Reporting Form.
PROJECT/EVENT:
SERVICE ORGANIZATION:
LOCATION:
DATE:
NUMBER OF BROTHERS IN ATTENDANCE:
TOTAL NUMBER OF SERVICE HOURS (TOTAL HOURS X NUMBER OF BROTHERS):
DID YOU PARTNER WITH ANY OTHER STUDENT ORGANIZATIONS OR COMMUNITY PARTNERS? WHO?
LIST THE PROJECT(S) YOUR MEMBERS TOOK PART IN THROUGHOUT THE DAY:
TG DAY OF SERVICE SIGN-IN SHEET
Print this sign-in sheet to bring with you to your TG Day of Service. If you’re able to bring a laptop for brothers to sign in on at the event, you may want to use this electronic TG Day of Service Sign-In Sheet instead.
NAME TIME IN TIME OUT CHECK IF YOU’RE A BROTHER
