Baker’s own Gamma Theta chapter of Delta Tau Delta recently brought home the Court of Honor Award. Chapter President Nick Yarbrough, along with seven other fraternity officers, received the award at the Western Plains Division Conference in Springfield, Missouri.

Every year since 1965, the top 20 chapters across the nation are recognized for excellence by receiving the Court of Honor Award.

“The conference itself was a little intimidating,” sophomore Logan Brettell said. “Just because of how many chapters were actually present, but we were confident in ourselves and knew how hard we had worked as a house and definitely felt very proud when we were announced as Court of Honor winners.”

Chapters are graded on chapter finance, academics, alumni relations, community service, recruitment and membership education. In one particular category, Baker’s Delta Tau Delta excelled.

“The category that we did best in in 2015 was recruitment,” Yarbrough said. “We ranked 10th in the nation in this category. We put a large emphasis on recruitment for the 2015 year and had a very successful recruitment program.”

The chapter also received something tangible along with the recognition; Gamma Theta members received a gavel that will be in their possession for the next year. The gavel will be used by both the current and future president at weekly chapter meetings.

Gamma Theta chapter of Delta Tau Delta won other awards at the conference as well, including one for having a GPA above the all-male and all-fraternity average, along with Outstanding Academic Programming. Chapter members were also proud to win the Shelter Pride Award, which is given to the chapter that maintains and takes the best care of their house.

The chapter recently took home more awards after the conclusion of 2016 Greek Week here at Baker. A few of those awards were Outstanding Risk Management, Outstanding New Member/Member Education and Outstanding Alumni Relations awards.

Delta Tau Delta also received the top honor at Greek Awards and earned the title of being a Five Star Chapter.

“It was nice to see the work we put into our house pay off,” junior Matt Bush said. “We were very excited to win.”

Yarbrough said that the leaders of the chapter want to put the younger members in a position where they will be successful in the future.

“I think the best way to continue this going forward is putting people in a position that will help them and the chapter succeed,” Yarbrough said. “Developing our young members to be leaders is extremely important and our upperclassmen to a good job of mentoring the younger guys.”

Chapter members also have goals for future awards.

“Our goal next year is to get the Hugh Shields Award, which would mean being a top 10 Delt chapter in the nation,” junior Andrew Dare said.