Mu Tau Mu of Alpha Chi Omega

Some fun ideas for celebrating International Women's Day (that also celebrate Alpha Chi Omega Ritual Celebration Week too!): 

News from the collegians at Zeta Upsilon chapter of Alpha Chi Omega. Please comment below or email us axozu25 at gmail if you can help. Thank you!

We are very excited and think this year's Domestic Violence Awareness Week is going to be really successful!! Here is the schedule of events for this year:

Monday, October 25: Self-Defense Class
Tuesday, October 26: Purple Day!
Wednesday, October 27: Hidden Voices/Luminaries
Friday, October 29: Kickball Tournament

As you know, we are always so honored and excited as well as extremely grateful to have the help of our alumnae. I wanted to give you a little bit of information that you could pass on to the rest of MTM.

We will, of course, be having our bake sale this year, from which all of the donations go straight to the DVC of Cleveland. We would LOVE any donations that alums would like to give in the Baked Goods area. We will be baking a lot ourselves, and will hopefully be getting donations of baked goods from elsewhere, but we couldn't do it without your help!!

Also, we are looking to create more interest in giving donations by having amazing prizes for our Kickball tournament this year and for our Raffle. On this note, I was wondering if you could ask around to see if any of the members of MTM are involved in large corporations where they might be able to get donated gift cards/food/money/etc. for our cause. Connections like that are always really helpful!

Lastly, we LOVE to have our alums at our events. If you would be interested, we would love to get alumnae involved in our Kickball Tournament. It is $50 to register a team of no more than 10. Again, all of the money we make goes straight to the Domestic Violence Center of Cleveland. It is always so exciting to have you guys come to our events! I hope you consider getting a team or a few teams together! If anyone is interested in registering a team, they can e-mail me at ejk35 at case dot edu.

Thank you!!

On Tuesday, October 19th, the Domestic Violence Center of Cleveland hosts their 17th Annual Break the Silence Luncheon from 11:30am - 1:30pm at Windows on the River. 

Mu Tau Mu is proud and very excited to be able to sponsor two Alpha Chi Omega collegians to attend the event! Get your tickets here!

Melissa Moore, author of Shattered Silence: The Untold Story of a Serial Killer's Daughter is the luncheon speaker. 

From the event flyer: "Melissa G. Moore, the daughter of Keith Hunter Jesperson, a man infamously known as the Happy Face serial killer, shares her personal experiences of surviving domestic violence abuse and how she escaped the perpetual cycle of violence. As seen on Oprah and Good Morning America, Melissa provides strength and hope, encouraging women who blame themselves to retain their belief in their self worth and life purpose when facing adversity."

From amazon.com: "Throughout her life, Melissa Jesperson Moore had to hide her true identity. She had pretended that life was perfect after her parents divorced and she was suddenly uprooted from everything familiar and loving. She had to be silent, and to pretend not to be disturbed or upset by her father's actions. Those experiences prepared Melissa to hide the deepest, darkest secret of all. As she began making different choices, building a successful and loving life on her own, her heart began to fill with rays of hope, though she could never quite rid herself of the dark shadow of secrecy and shame. Then one day, her beautiful, innocent daughter looked into her eyes and said, "Mommy, everybody's got a daddy. Where's your daddy?" Shattered Silence is an astonishing, true narrative of personal and spiritual transformation. From her secret life as "the daughter of The Happy Face Serial Murderer" to a woman that bared her soul and inspired millions, Melissa leads the reader on the vulnerable, compelling, and sometimes very raw journey of what it took to shatter the silence, and claim her own life."

 See all the events DVC has planned for Domestic Violence Awareness Month here, and follow DVC on Twitter @DVCCleveland. Follow the author Melissa Moore on Twitter as well @missybeans.

During September, we'll offer suggestions for plans Alpha Chi Omega sisters everywhere can make to commemorate Domestic Violence Awareness Month, which runs October 1st to 31st. 

Our first suggestion involves working with our Alpha Chi Omega DVA partners Macy's and the Family Violence Prevention Fund. FVPF brings us one of our favorite programs: the Give Respect campaign. 

Each fall, Macy's hosts Shop For A Cause at its stores nationwide. The details (from the Macy's website): 

Shop for a Cause is Macy's national charity shopping day that offers the opportunity for local nonprofit organizations to raise funds in their communities. Since 2006, Shop for a Cause has helped raise more than $34 million for thousands of charity partners.

How it works:
Macy's invites charities to sign up, sell $5 tickets and keep 100% of the proceeds of every ticket they sell. Macy's also sells $5 tickets in-store with all proceeds benefiting designated charities. Customers purchasing tickets benefit by receiving incredible storewide shopping savings all day on October 16, 2010. On October 16, Macy's also hosts special events, prizes and other in-store excitement. Read more here.

There are two ways Shop for Cause can benefit domestic violence awareness. First, tickets sold nationwide at the register in all Macy's stores on October 16th will benefit Feeding America (and local food banks) and Family Violence Prevention Fund. Second, you can check the list of local causes to see if your community's DV shelter is registered as a cause for the day. The list is here. (A third alternative is to organize ticket sales for your local service provider - it's easy and risk-free. Details are here.) 

Whichever way you choose to go, we hope you'll be out supporting the cause on October 16th!