Last week, all the fraternities and sororities on campus joined together to participate in Greek Week, a former annual event that has not taken place at Mississippi State University since 2016.
Greek Week offered fraternity and sorority members the opportunity to bond through different activities highlighting the core values of Greek life: service, unity, academics, diversity and inclusion.
The first Greek Week dates back to the 90s. However, this typically annual event was cancelled last year because of scheduling conflicts with Limelight, an annual fundraising dance competition between the different campus organizations.
Since this year started this tradition again, Seth Male, director of programming for Interfraternal Council, said he believes this week and the following events have been and will be successful.
“I think it has gone great. It’s cool to see four worlds with four different kinds of students come together,” Male said.
There are four different councils who oversee Greek Life: the National Pan-Hellenic Council for predominately African American Greek life, the Interfraternal Council for predominately white fraternities, Multicultural Greek Council for predominately Latinos and Panhellenic Council for predominately white sororities.
Students got free chicken biscuits and t-shirts by visiting the Greek Life office. The purpose was to promote the office and encourage Greeks to utilize the office.

On Tuesday, the documentary “Haze” was shown in the Bettersworth Auditorium in Lee Hall as a way to increase the understanding and awareness of the serious nature and permanent effects of hazing. “Haze” focused on Gordie Bailey, a student who pledged fraternity Chi Psi and was the victim of a fatal hazing incident at University of Colorado in 2004. The film was followed by panel discussion.
Eric Lucas, the president of the National Pan-Hellenic Council, said all activities during Greek Week were voluntary, but the “Haze” film had a great turn out.
“While we have been blessed at Mississippi State not to have any serious hazing allegations, it is still a great thing to bring awareness to,” Lucas said.
Male said the film had a powerful impact, even on members who are typically light-hearted.
“That was eye opening to me especially,” Male said. “I have juniors in my fraternity who aren’t the type of person who would be touched by a film like that, but they were like, ‘Dude, that hit.'”
Wednesday was Scholar’s Day, a day designed to reinforce importance of academics. A seminar was held to inform students in Greek life on how to develop study skills, as well as the importance of studying.
Unfortunately, the events on Thursday and Friday were rescheduled due to the unforeseen bad weather and other scheduling conflicts.
Anna McGuire, the director of activities for the Panhellenic Council, said the weather caused a change in scheduling, but they were determined to host the planned activities.
“You expect the week to go flawlessly and then you’re like, ‘Okay, kind of blew up in my face,’ but we’ve gotten it worked out,” McGuire said. “We’re just going to morph it into a Greek Week 2.0 because of the rain.”
The Greek Olympics scheduled for last Thursday were rescheduled to Oct. 2. This event will have multiple teams composed of a mixture of the different councils compete in outdoor sporting events.
Lucas said the Greek Olympics is the center of the week, and is designed to build a sense of unity among all members of Greek life.
“The point of Greek Week is to build relationships across councils, and that’s what we were really going to focus on during Greek Olympics,” Lucas said.
Field Day at Henderson Ward Elementary School, where Greek members will have a massive recess with the school’s students, was originally planned for last Friday but was rescheduled to Oct. 5 due to standardized testing.
McGuire said the weather or scheduling conflicts will not stop the Greek members in completing the Greek Week activities.
“It would be so easy to cancel the events,” McGuire said. “Just because it’s not during Greek Week, it doesn’t mean we aren’t trying to promote Greek unity at all times of the year.”