History

BEGINNINGS

The Milwaukee School of Engineering Interest Group originally started in fall of 2011. The Eta Chapter of Sigma Phi Delta approached Milwaukee School of Engineering (MSOE) seeking to expand to MSOE's campus. After gaining at least four members, the executive board was established and the group started the process to petition. The elected president then found out that he would not be able to participate, and that set off a chain of events that left only one member of the interest group still involved come spring 2012. After recruitment right before the end of the school year, the group was up to three members, but they were unable to continue with the process to petition. Once back on campus in fall 2012, the group was able to recruit more members and finally finish the process to petition to become a colony of Sigma Phi Delta. The MSOE interest group submitted their Petition for Colonization to the Supreme Council for review on December 3rd, 2012.

2012-2013

On January 26th, 2013, members of the Sigma Phi Delta International Fraternity met in Milwaukee and fifteen MSOE students were initiated as pledges during the Colonization Weekend. Two additional members were initiated as pledges on March 17th, 2013. Over the spring of 2013, the MSOE colony participated in two events to clean up the downtown of Milwaukee, and participated in a Blood Drive. The colony also worked with MSOE Student Life to run an annual event to promote the various minors at MSOE, and attend the MSOE Leadership Day to potentially run that in the future as well. The colony participated in MSOE's St. Patrick's Week, and won the Engineering Olympics Event. On May 25th, 2013, the MSOE colony graduated their first alumni: Aaron Becker with a B.S. in Industrial Engineering. Over the summer of 2013, the MSOE colony worked to fulfill the requirements set before them in order to become a full chapter of Sigma Phi Delta. On October 19th, 2013, the ten remaining members of the MSOE colony became the Beta-Mu chapter of the Sigma Phi Delta International Fraternity. Shortly thereafter, eleven young men were initiated as the first pledge class of the Beta-Mu chapter.

2013-2014

During the winter semester of the 2013-2014 school year, the Beta-Mu chapter participated in volunteer events that included renovating a center for helping parents and children affected by child abuse. The group also helped to run a video game tournament alongside another MSOE organization. On February 8th, 2014, the Beta-Mu chapter initiated seven new members into the fraternity, the Alpha class. On March 1st, 2014, Beta-Mu graduated its first alumni as a chapter, and second alumni overall: Mihir Shah with a B.S. in Industrial Engineering. During the spring of 2014, the group participated in more volunteer events including cleaning up trash around the streets of Milwaukee. The chapter also participated in MSOE's St. Patrick's Week, ran another video game tournament, and continued its annual event to promote the minors available at MSOE. There were also two opportunities to participate in the colonization of a chapter at the University of Missouri, and the reactivation of the Upsilon chapter at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in which brothers traveled to the prospective colonies to meet, advise, and celebrate with the new colony members. On April 4th, 2014, the Beta-Mu chapter was voted in as a full voting member of Greek Council at MSOE.

2014-2015

The 2014-2015 school year was a very interesting one at Beta-Mu. During the fall quarter Beta-Mu pinned the Beta Class, who were initiated on January 10th, 2015. This brought 7 new bothers into the organization eager to make a difference. Throughout the year Brothers from Beta-Mu were able to attend to the colonization and Charter of Rho along with the Charters of Beta-Omicron and Beta-Pi. Beta-Mu also visited Kappa chapter for a weekend in late October. While all of these were great accomplishments, they all were overshadowed by the first annual Winter Formal. In the works since January 2014, the Brothers of Beta-Mu wanted to make an impact on the lives of the students of MSOE and also the surrounding community. With these goals in mind the idea for the Winter Formal was conceived. The idea came to fruition on February 7th, 2015 when 450 students walked the red carpet to watch The Antics perform at the “Red Carpet Formal”. This event set the record for the largest student-run event in the 111 year history of MSOE, and raised $4500 for the Milwaukee Rescue Mission. Bet-Mu continued to give back to the local community by participating in the “Greek-Clean Up” with multiple Greek organizations from many different colleges and universities throughout Milwaukee, then closed out the year by traveling to Chicago Illinois to help rebuild homes for those in need.

2015-2016

This year proved to be a big year for Beta-Mu as it was the first year a full class would be graduating from the school. The Brothers hit the ground running with recruitment that brought 16 pledges to be pinned on September 27, 2015.

2016-2017

The Epsilon Class was initiated with 7 new members. Not a single pledge went through the process without completing! The Annual Camping trip was held. The formal was not continued unfortunately. The boys also participated in the the all Greek clean up.

2017-2018

Zeta Class had a pledge class of 5 with 2 new brothers being initiated into the fraternity. The Annual camping Trip was held it was one of the coldest camping trips yet and the fraternity participated in the all Greek clean up.

2018-2019

During the fall semester of the 2018-2019 school year the Beta-Mu chapter pinned a pledge class of 5 with 2 making it through to initiation. We saw another Castle Day come and go and there was much celebration at the Castle. The rest of the school year was quiet until we had our second spring pledge class come through. For the second time we have had a brother re-pledge the fraternity and make it through, this time finishing as an initiate of Theta class as a class of one. Unfortunately, initiation occurred on April 7th coinciding with Greek clean up and Beta-Mu was not able to participate. Beta-Mu did make up for this volunteering at the Ecology Center in Milwaukee. Where they walked the paths alongside the river picking up trash. The annual camping trip was held on May 3-5th 2019 at Kettle Moraine State Park where all the active brother we able to attend as well as a handful of Alumni filtering in and out. This year also saw the first alumni-active Beta-Mu Summit. Where alumni and the actives met to discuss what steps are to be taken next for the chapter. Topics discussed we, rush, budget, saving for a chapter house, as well as short term goals and long term goals for the chapter.

2019-2020

During the Fall Semester of our 2019-2020 school year our Chapter pinned another great pledge class of 6 with 2 becoming full brothers by the end. This year the some of the brothers of the fraternity took an extra step to work in the Greek community as Brother Denny and Stowe doubled their duties with Stowe being bother the fraternities and Greek councils President and Denny being Treasure like wise. With this BM took reach out to more of the Schools Greek community volunteering with groups like KSM and Circle K. The fraternity again had a great time at Castle Day as many alumni traveled to join the actives at the new house this year. Beta-Mu and Kappa kept up their tradition of visiting each other as 7 members of Kappa came up and visited in the fall and 4 members of Beta-Mu went down and visited Kappa in the spring. Beta-Mu also Strengthened ties with Eta as they went to participate in their warrior games. Beta-Mu was also lucky to have central province director Jon Eastham and newly appointed director of chapter development Jack Panella come and visit. They worked it the fraternity on what strategies that would have going forward this year, as well as goals for the future. Spring Rush this year brought in a class of 3. The unfortunate circumstances of Covid-19 caused Beta-Mu to have to Suspend the pledging process and all further activities and the school closed down. Despite the effects of the Covid-19 virus Beta-Mu finished off the year strong seeing three of is seniors graduate Brother Emini, Petter and Cervantez-Maldonado. Despite the circumstances Beta-Mu managed to spend some time together whether is was the brothers that lived together at the house or if it was after restrictions were lifted and the brothers getting together to enjoy trips, sporting events or other activities. They looked forward to restarting the pledge class of the spring and bring in new pledges to try and become brother of Sigma Phi Delta

2021-2022

The 2021-2022 school year was a crucial one for the Chapter. We pinned 4 pledges in Fall, with 3 becoming full brothers at the end of a fufilling process. As the world continued to work through the COVID-19 pandemic, brothers were very socially active on campus and helped to organize many student events, for both the fraternity and Greek Life as a whole. Active Brother Alex Tofan worked as our Greek Council representative and improved our relations with the sororities at MSOE in particular. Two of the new brothers, Ian Czerkis and Henry Aerts, organized a philanthropic event that raised almost $100 for a local STEM-focused charity. All 6 active brothers of our chapter also visited the Kappa chapter during Spring alongside alumni, continuing our strong relationship. Also in the Spring, another enjoyable camping trip with actives and alumni took place at Governor Dodge State Park. Towards the end of the year, we said our goodbyes to graduating brothers James Lang and James Rector. Looking forward to next year, the active brothers aimed to expand membership and improve the rush process for next Fall.