Sacramento State welcomes an old Greek friend from the past this semester. Delta Chi is recruiting fraternity members this fall for its second go-round with the campus community.

The Delta Chi fraternity returns to Sac State after seven years of absence due to lack of membership.

“We closed seven years ago when many of the potential new colony members for this expansion were not even in high school,” said Daniel Kim, Delta Chi leadership consultant.

Starting Thursday, Kim said Delta Chi will be searching for men to become the founding fathers and pledges of the new chapter at Sac State. They will be guided by a group of older alumni from Sac State and surrounding chapters who are willing to advise the young members.

“Sac State is the perfect place for Delta Chi because it offers a very diverse population,” Kim said. “I feel Delta Chi can offer Sacramento State students a lot in terms of networking, personal development and leadership development.”

Delta Chi consists of 133 chapters and colonies operating throughout the United States and Canada. It has chapters distributed roughly throughout colleges and universities across the continent, Kim said. Today, Delta Chi has 98,000 members and is expected to grow to over 100,000 after this fall semester.

“We are excited to have more Greek development here on campus, which means more community, as well as campus involvement from fellow students,” said Melissa Davey, president of the Panhellenic Council, one of three fraternity/sorority councils at Sac State. “Delta Chi will be a hardworking fraternity to get themselves established on campus, and I look forward to all that they offer.”

The requirements associated with becoming a member of the Delta Chi fraternity are a minimum GPA of 2.50 as well as certain character qualities the fraternity determines.

Costs associated with the membership total $360 for the first semester. The initiation dues are $205, and $100 for associate member dues. Membership fees are $55 and collected every semester after that.

Delta Chi’s presence at Sac State this semester was not by chance. The Interfraternity Council (IFC) at Sac State decided that it was time for it to expand. In order for this to happen, an expansion committee needed to be assembled.

Interfraternity Council Executive Vice President Logan Rivenes put together the expansion committee that would go on to select another fraternity to join the Greek community. The committee consisted of six members.

With this new committee, the council came up with a list of criteria for a fraternity to be considered for expansion at Sac State. Delta Chi met all the criteria and shined through as an exceptional candidate, he said. When the decision was brought to the IFC, the vote was unanimous in favor of Delta Chi and a formal invitation was sent; Delta Chi accepted.

Rivenes said that he and the council are very excited to bring Delta Chi fraternity back to Sac State and to expend the Greek community on campus.

Rivenes said the choice of Delta Chi being brought back to Sac State was an obvious one. The strong alumni base in Sacramento and a strong national fraternity backing the expansion make Delta Chi a perfect candidate.

“I can assure Sac State that Delta Chi will be a huge asset to the Interfraternity Council, the Greek system, the campus and the community,” Rivenes said. “We have nothing but high hopes for the expansion.”

Delta Chi told Sac State’s IFC that it will not start recruiting until two weeks following the start of the fall semester, after the current IFC fraternities had already pledged their men, as a sign of respect and thankfulness for Sac State and the other fraternities.

“They did this out of courtesy, as a way of saying thank you for bringing us back on campus; we’ll let everyone else have their picks first so it does not feel like we are imposing on the rest,” said Leanna Neves-Bogetti, program adviser at the Student Activities office.

Delta Chi dates back to 1890, when 11 law students at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., formed a law fraternity but soon grew into a social fraternity. In 1922 the fraternity had grown into a respectable organization.

In 1929 Delta Chi became the first fraternity to abolish hazing, a ritualistic test and a task involving harassment, abuse or humiliation used to initiate someone into a fraternity.