A decade of sisters are coming together to celebrate their organization’s founding.
Plattsburgh State’s Sigma Lambda Upsilon sorority will host an event Nov. 14 with the theme of “A Decade in Time” to recognize the organization’s 10th anniversary.
The PSUC chapter’s former president and senior Mariah Santiago has been planning the event since the spring as the undergraduate liaison between alumnae members and current undergraduates.
Santiago said the event will include dinner, poetry and music performances, a speech from a national founding mother Carmen Quinones, who graduated from SUNY Binghamton, and a slide show with messages from members who could not attend.
“We won’t talk the entire time,” Santiago said. “There will be a dance floor with plenty of room to celebrate.”
Sigma Lambda Upsilon, or Señoritas Latinas Unidas Sorority, Inc., was nationally founded Dec. 1, 1987, at Binghamton University. In the almost 30 years since its establishment, the organization has expanded to more than 50 schools across the country and has touched the lives of more than 900 women. There are currently six active members on the PSUC campus.
“It (the event) is to highlight what we’ve done so far,” Santiago said. “Some of our founders wouldn’t have thought that our organization would be where it is now 10 years later.”
Santiago said the chapter’s alumnae have been very involved with planning the event, and the active members are passionate about sharing their organization’s message.
“Some of them are working with the finance aspect, mostly fundraisers, because we don’t really have a budget to work off of,” Santiago said.
Other alumnae are involved with making sure the event is timely, helping decorating and planning bonding events for members of the organization in the future.
Santiago said she and other members of the organization are happy to see alumnae back at PSUC and still involved.
“Because there’s only six of us, it was important for one of us to step up and learn how to fulfill the role,” Santiago’s successor, Vicki Garcia, said. “So when Mariah graduates, we can still run the chapter successfully.”
The active members are passionate about sharing their organization’s values, which are sincerity, loyalty and unity, according to sigmalambdaupsilon.org. They hope this event will show the importance of maintaining relationships with other members, even after graduation.
“We really want to show the Plattsburgh community the strong bonds we have with our hermanas,” Garcia said.
“It’s a very emotional and meaningful time for us,” Garcia said. “Being new members, we really loved meeting the old hermanas and seeing how close they still are after 10 years.”
She said alumnae from other chapters across the country will be involved in the celebration, making it difficult to estimate how many people will be in attendance.
PSUC junior Mya Bradley, who is new to the organization, was able to meet some of the chapter’s alumnae over the summer.
“Whether you’re meeting them for the first time or just seeing them for the first time in a while. there’s always that nostalgia,” Bradley said. “You can just get together with them and not feel out of place.”
The sisters encourage people to attend the event to see how much the sisterhood has changed the lives of its members and get an inside look of how fraternity and sorority life can potentially provide members with opportunities during and after their college years.
The event will take place at Plattsburgh Elks 621. located at 56 Cumberland Ave. at 6 p.m. Tickets are being sold for $20 and are available at the information desk in the Angell College Center or online at tickets.plattsburgh.edu.
Email Madison Winters at madison.winters@cardinalpointsonline.com
