Suffolk’s very own fraternity, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, has been chartered as an official fraternity as of Feb. 18.

“We are getting bigger, our recruitment is always occurring,” said international student and freshman Maurice Nataf who was recently initiated into the fraternity.  He says the fraternity has a great group of people who have helped his transition into the first year in Boston.

The fraternity now includes  42 members, but was officially started by 11 founding fathers in September 2009.  Disappointed to see no Greek Life at Suffolk, they decided by their sophomore year to work on creating a fraternity in order to develop brotherhood bonds that would last a lifetime.

Fraternities have to start as colonies before they can become chartered.  The Suffolk fraternity originally had 11 members as a colony, with only five of those members still remaining to see it officially chartered.

This was a big step for the fraternity, according to Fraternity President Jared Pelletier and Chartering Chairman Michael Gesualdi.  Getting the charter for the fraternity took two years worth of work.  Gesualdi and other members organized 12 areas of the fraternity to show their progress since they were chartered.

In November they were evaluated during an In Province Inspection in which a presentation was given in front of the province (region) archon, chapter advisor, as well as SAE brothers in other chapters around Boston. After passing, an eight hour Out of Province Inspection followed, with national fraternity representatives visiting. They were finally given their charter on Feb  18.

With the charter will come an official initiation in May.  The first day will include a dinner with national fraternity representation, followed by an official initiation, where members will learn the rituals and secrets of the fraternity. On the final day, there will be a banquet held where the fraternity will actually receive the charter.  At this time each member will also receive an official number correlating to their pledge in the fraternity.

Recruitment is one of the fraternity’s biggest focuses, according to Pelletier and Gesualdi.  The fraternity seeks students who will emulate the “True Gentleman,” which has become the fraternity’s creed.  When students become interested in joining the fraternity they attend rush, two weeks of events where they become familiar with the fraternity members.  After rush, students can be invited to pledge, which leads to a six week program.  If the students pass their tests at the end of the program, they will be initiated.  Overall, this process takes about a whole semester.  Recruitment is important to the Fraternity members. Each year, they need to be sure that worthy students will be able to run the fraternity the way graduating members have during their time at Suffolk.

“I want it to be the biggest thing ever,” said Gesualdi.  This semester there will be about 10 new members.

The fraternity members spend a lot of their time planning events, like the recent dodge ball tournament held with SUNORML and the Student Government Association.  The fraternity especially encourages new members to plan events in order to promote brotherhood bonding.  Suffolk’s two sororities, Sigma Gamma Rho and Theta Phi Alpha, have also collaborated with the fraternity, especially during Greek Week, which is to take place the week following Spring Break.

Greek Week will include a decathlon between the fraternity and sororities.  There will also be a Greek formal and service day.  At the end of the week one of the Greek groups will be awarded an unofficial trophy.

Although the fraternity does not have an official house, they meet every Monday in the Donahue building.  In the future, there are possibilities to add a Greek house, which would provide an opportunity for commuter members to have a place to live.  “You don’t need to have a campus to have successful Greek Life,” says Pelletier.