Blog #10: Ethnography Topic

For our ethnography project I was thinking about writing about the discourse community that is SDSU's very own Alpha Phi Omega, Alpha Delta chapter. APO is the largest community service fraternity worldwide and is grounded on the idea of Leadership, Friendship, and Service.
I wanted to choose this fraternity in particular because I'm part of this discourse community.
It interests me because its what makes up the majority of my social circle and my brothers are, essentially, my extended family.
What I already know about this community is that they strive to be a welcoming group of people who accepts anyone who wants to join. Because of this, it's a large organization with nearly 200 active members and about 35 pledges each semester. Although the pledging program is different each semester, I'm familiar with the basic guidelines since I was a pledge 1 1/2 years ago.
To be a part of APO one must attend a few recruiting events, be invited to pledge, and then attend a pinning ceremony that makes the pledge status official. The pledge then goes through a rigorous program for the rest of the academic semester and will have to complete leadership, friendship, and service requirements that the pledge trainers assign them. Upon completion of these requirements, the pledge goes through another pinning ceremony and officially becomes a neophyte.
I want to research APO's history from its father chapter to SDSU's own chartering. I want to look into all of the traditions, symbols, coat of arms, and other miscellaneous characteristics that gives APO its identity. I want to see how it's executive committee functions so that their able to properly communicate with the active body to achieve the goals they set for themselves and successfully retain old members and induct new ones to the fraternity each semester.