Penn State junior Doug Campbell of Alpha Tau Omega recently became the Interfraternity Council’s president for the upcoming academic year. Now in his new role, he’s hoping to strengthen relations between the IFC board and the university at large.
We sat down with Campbell this week to learn more about his aspirations, his role, and him as a person.
Onward State: What duties does the IFC president have?
Doug Campbell: The IFC president has a duty to serve the community by coordinating relationships internally and externally. It’s the executive board’s job to advocate for the members of our community and help lead them to be successful as individuals and as organizations.
As president, I manage the operations of the executive board and the Presidents’ Council. The majority of our external relationships involve the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life (OFSL), the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Compliance (OFSC), and the Office of Student Conduct (OSC).
OS: What are your goals during your term as IFC president?
DC: This period of time for not just the IFC, but for most organizations on campus, is very crucial. We are in a state where organizations are still recovering from the pandemic and what leadership roles do now is really going to set the tone for years to come.
With that, we are really looking to strengthen our community’s relationships internally. We want to provide our members with organized operations and clear communication as best we can. If chapter presidents and executive boards feel like we are always available for assistance, then that is a success.
We have two other big goals for our term, one of which is to make a smoother recruitment process to help our PNM (potential new member) numbers stay high. The other goal is gaining a stronger presence of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives within the community, which we are implementing in recruitment as well. Our vice president of DEI, Moises Hernandez, has done a great job working with the rest of the board to launch our new DEI scholarship, which will gain its first recipients in the fall semester. These are just a few initiatives we have, and we are looking forward to continuing to expand ideas throughout the summer and fall semesters.
