Mike Young

Mike Young
Name	Mike Young
Chapter	Gamma Zeta Western Carolina University
Date Inducted	November 16th, 2004
Roll Number	ΓΖ 236
Alumni Chapter/Assoc
Honorary Member
Major	B.S. in Chemistry, B.S. in Biology, B.A. in Music Industry (Not Completed)
Birthdate	May 1, 1985
Spouse
Nicknames	"Likes 'Um"
Awards

Mike Young (born 1 May 1985) is an Active Member of Gamma Zeta Chapter (ΓΖ 236) located at Western Carolina University.

Fraternity Life and Career

Mike decided to join Phi Sigma Pi when a girl he knew from band asked him to come out to the chapter's second rush in Spring of 2004. He wasn't able to attend however, and made it his goal to attend the following semester's (Fall 2004) rush. The girl, Carrie Petrea (ΓΖ 226) would later become first his big brother, and later his Initiate Advisor. After a rough initiate semester (for example, he made exactly an 80 on his national exam), Mike wanted to prove that he could be a valuable asset to the fraternity.

First Mike served as a member of the chapter's service committee. The following semester he was both scholarship committee head and the chapter's assistant initiate advisor. The class he presided over as Assistant IA was the Tau class, in which he was voted by the class an "Honorary Tau." The following semester he served as Head IA for the Upsilon class. That summer Mike traveled to that year's Grand Chapter with his Big Brother Carrie. They took local soft drinks Cheerwine and Sundrop along to give to those Brothers not fortunate enough to have access to them. There in Mooresville Mike was delighted to be involved with so many Brothers from around the country.

Following his term as Head IA, Mike left the chapter's eboard and sought to increase the Gamma Zeta Chapter's involvement in the local community. As head of the Service Committee, Mike got the chapter involved with a local philanthropy, the "Community Table," a local soup kitchen. Mike managed to drastically increase participation by brothers in serving the local area.

With experience on four of the six chapter committees (Alumni, Service, Awards & Scholarship, and the Initiation Committee), Mike was then elected to a half-year term as Vice President for Spring 2007. To the position he brought his experience, and insured that events were planned as well as could be, and made sure all duties were being met (a first until that point). To his credit, none of Mike's committee heads failed in writing and submitting their form 110 reports, a first during his time in the Gamma Zeta Chapter. That summer Mike traveled again to represent his chapter at Grand Chapter. It was hot, but the trip was definitely worth it.

Following that he switched places with brother Ashley Hardin (ΓΖ 260) for his role of Corresponding Secretary for Fall 2007. He also headed the Alumni Committee that semester. While he was not able to reach his goal of reaching out to any of Gamma Zeta's "lost alumni," he felt he had gotten a lot of alumni involved at least a little whom he had never met.

After the early graduation of the Chapter President, Mike was re-elected Vice President in Spring 2008. Drawing on the experiences of his previous term, Mike quickly sought to organize the committees better, as well as implement a new idea obtained from the Brothers of Clemson University's Beta Kappa Chapter. By condensing committee meetings inside a small block of the weekly business meetings, all committees were guaranteed to be meeting. Coupled with this was a policy on how events could be planned (via the required approval of a board made up of all the committee heads), and more expectations of what types of events could be planned (such as the differentiation of what subject matter scholarships would endorse). Mike also served that semester as Public Relations Committee Head, something he later wished he could have avoided as it prevented him from running it as well as he would have liked the committee to be run (mostly because the time demands on the PR Head and VP occurred at the same time).

The Fall 2008 semester will see Mike returning to the previous role of Vice President, as well as heading the Initiation Committee. Under the new system the chapter had adopted, Mike could head the Initiation Committee outside of the times other committees would meet. This also allowed all the required members on the Initiation Committee (such as the Initiate Advisors and the Recruitment Advisor) to still be involved directly with other committees, a boon with the chapter's low numbers.

Collegiate Years at Gamma Zeta Chapter

• Spring 2009 - Vice President, Initiation Committee Head
• Fall 2008 - Vice President, Initiation Committee Head
• Spring 2008 - Vice President, Public Relations Committee Head
• Fall 2007 - Corresponding Secretary, Alumni Committee Head
• Spring2007 - Vice President, Service Committee Co-Head
• Fall 2006 - Service Committee Head
• Spring 2006 - Head Initiate Advisor
• Fall 2005 - Assistant Initiate Advisor, Awards & Scholarship Committee Head
• Spring 2005 - Member of the Service Committee
• Fall 2004 - Initiate Class Secretary, Historian, Scholarship Chair

Chapter Awards Received

Spring 2009

• Brother of the Year (2008-2009)
• Chapter Service Key
• "Most Likely to Choke a Chicken" Award
• Initiate Class' "Open Arms" Award

Fall 2008

• History Quiz Winner
• Leadership Award
• "Most Experienced Brother" Award

Spring 2008

• Initiate Class' Most Helpful Brother Award
• Initiate Class' Ominous Glare Award
• Most Helpful Award
• Leadership Award
• "Most Likely to be on Top" Award

Fall 2007

• "Most Likely to Randomly Start a Game of Hangman" Award
• "Most Likely to Run Over Someone" Award

Spring 2007

• Initiate Class' "Most Likely to be Hospitalized as a Result of Riding a Mechanical Bull" Award

Fall 2006

• Initiate Class' "Most Likely to be Wearing Their Underwear Backwards" Award
• Scariest Brother Award

Fall 2005

• Initiate Class' "Honorary Tau" Award

Spring 2005

• The Gumby Award (For being flexible and willing to help)
• The Rubber Chicken Award (For making everyone smile)

National Involvement

• Grand Chapter Alternate (Summer 2008)
• Alternative Break Project (January 2008)
• National Development Committee (2007-present)
• Grand Chapter Delegate (Summer 2007)
• Grand Chapter Alternate (Summer 2005)

Bigs and Littles

Mike is the Little Brother of:

• Carrie Petrea (Xi Class, ΓΖ 226)

Mike is the Big Brother of:

• Heather Wilkes (Sigma Class, ΓΖ 242)
• Adam Hardin (Tau Class, ΓΖ 259)
• Grant Newman (Chi Class, ΓΖ 275)
• Doug Pope (Alpha Beta, ΓΖ 283)

Hopefully it will stop right there.