Four years ago, the members of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity pledge class made a promise to each other.

The promise was to raise their fraternity to new heights, to fix old problems with new solutions and most importantly, to be a part of the select few to receive the Hugh Shields Award for Chapter Excellence.

With one phone call on the night of Feb. 27, former Delta Tau Delta president Jeff Skillman learned that he and his brothers made good on their promise.

Baker University’s Gamma Theta chapter was given the Hugh Shields Award, and the accompanying honor of being one of the top 10 chapters of the 116 nationwide, for the fourth time in the awards’ 44 years of existence.

“It’s gratifying to know that all of our hard work hasn’t gone unnoticed,” Skillman said. “By no means was this an overnight thing. It’s been a gradual process and now we’re bringing honor to the organization as a whole.”

In order to be eligible for any of the awards offered at the conference, each chapter submits a fraternity awards/accreditation report, which is a documentation of academic achievement, financial stability, recruitment, member education, campus involvement, faculty relations, philanthropy involvement, community service and overall chapter operations.

The reports are analyzed based on a point system and the 10 chapters with the highest number are given the most prestigious of the awards, the coveted Hugh Shields Award.

“Anytime a Greek organization receives recognition like this, it’s a reflection on the school,” Steve Rottinghaus, Baker University public relations director, said. “As a whole, this speaks volumes about the kind of students we have at Baker.”

With a new financial strategy and the “most successful recruitment in decades,” according to Delta Tau Delta president Bradford Oliva, the fraternity’s 39 members caught the eye of those evaluating them. After winning smaller awards over the years, the fraternity made an even greater effort to develop chapter operations in order to achieve an even greater status.

"What we like to do is just focus on one thing at a time as a house and make sure we're doing that one thing correctly," Oliva said. "Then we move on from there and build off of that success. It's about doing all the little things so that we can get to the big things. The awards come after all the effort."<br/>