Sigma Alpha Epsilon Pi () is a national

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

sorority In North America, fraternities and sororities ( and ) are social clubs at colleges and universities. They are sometimes collectively referred to as Greek life or Greek-letter organizations, as well as collegiate fraternities or collegiate sorori ...

. It was founded on October 1, 1998, at the

University of California, Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Davis, California, United States. It is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University ...

History

In the early 1990s with the closing of a national Jewish sorority on its campus, the

was left without a Jewish women's social organization. Several women on campus noticed the gap left by the absence of the former sorority and began strategizing how to start an organization on campus that would fill the need. Members of

Alpha Epsilon Pi Alpha Epsilon Pi (), commonly known as AEPi, is a college Fraternities and sororities, fraternity founded at New York University in 1913. The fraternity has more than 150 active chapters across the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Israel ...

, a national Jewish fraternity, also urged the women of Davis to start a Jewish women's social organization of their own. With a positive response from the campus, Sigma Alpha Epsilon Pi was formed. The main archive URL i
The Baird's Manual Online Archive homepage
The "Sigma" is meant to represent "sisters of" in honor of Alpha Epsilon Pi's contributions towards the formation of the sorority. Sigma is also the 18th letter of the

Greek alphabet The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. It was derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and is the earliest known alphabetic script to systematically write vowels as wel ...

; in Jewish tradition, the number eighteen means chai (life). The six women who founded the sorority—Alycia Seaman, Erin Glick, Leah Dansker, Rachel Rothfarb, Erin Barker, and Dana Miller—are considered the eternal mothers of the sorority. Despite its formative Jewish identity, the sorority allows no discrimination based on race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, or handicap. SAEPi's publication is called ''The Iris Petal,'' with a quarterly publication schedule. The first season of

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’s ''

Sorority Life ''Sorority Life'' is a reality television series on MTV that aired from June 24, 2002, to November 19, 2003. The show consisted of girls pledging to become part of a sorority. Production The first season occurred at University of California, D ...

'' was filmed in the spring of 2002 on the UC Davis campus featuring members and pledges of ΣΑΕΠ. Through the airing of the show, ΣΑΕΠ began to expand across the country.

Symbols

The sorority's mascot is the lioness, representing "strength, power, and force." The sorority's flower is the blue iris. From the Iris, its colors are blue and gold, explained as. "Blue is prominent in Judaism, and gold symbolizes the richness ΣΑΕΠ brings to its members." Additionally, these colors are used to identify the University of California, where the sorority was founded. The sorority's gemstone is the sapphire.

Governance

A national board was started in the summer of 2002 to oversee the expansion and growth of ΣΑΕΠ as a nationwide sorority. Currently, there are seven alumnae from different chapters voluntarily serving as directors on the National Board. In early 2017, the National Board voted to restructure to consolidate operational functions into the Executive Office, maintaining the National Board for governance, strategic planning, and oversight.

Philanthropy

At the 2008 national convention, Cancer Schmancer was selected as the sorority's national philanthropy. In 2011, the National Board re-evaluated the national philanthropy and decided to move on to an organization that encompasses all of the philosophies of Sigma Alpha Epsilon Pi.

American Jewish World Service American Jewish World Service (AJWS) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit international development and human rights organization that supports community-based organizations in 19 countries in the developing world and works to educate the American Jewish com ...

was chosen. In addition to the national philanthropy, some chapters also support local philanthropies.

Chapters

In the following list of Sigma Alpha Epsilon Pi chapters, active chapters are listed in bold and inactive chapters are listed in ''italics''.

References