The Five People Who Will Run Your Next Executive Board

fratbryan19199112 years ago

As we approach the end of spring semester, most chapters are probably getting close to electing a new executive board. You remember exec election day, right? It’s that one chapter meeting of the year that lasts five long hours. Nobody will stop shit-talking. The candidates and yourself are slumped over in a stupor, thanking the lord that you had the foresight to fill your cup of sweet tea with enough vodka to effectively put you in a coma. Yeah, that chapter.

While exec nominations are mostly bullshit and do not necessarily warrant much attention, hence the coma-inducing vodka, it is still interesting to see your chapter dynamics play out as you elect the leaders who will be responsible for narrowly avoiding the accusations of your university’s conduct office. They will be the ones who will look in the mirror every night before they go to sleep and practice saying, “Our fraternity does not, nor will it ever, condone any form of hazing.” Ahhhhh… classic.

I am sure there will be some asshole in the comments section who will call me a dumb intern/pledge/bitch, and then point out that their chapter has a different exec setup and that they elect the president differently. So, I will just get this out of the way: my observations are generalized and do not necessarily represent the exact nature of any specific chapter. There you go, asshole. Disclaimer over.

Secretary

You may call the title something else, but every chapter has that one exec member who does all the paper work, takes attendance and is shit on by most of the chapter for being a complete joke. This job is just a repeat of pledge semester all over again. The secretary will deal with all the trivial bullshit and paperwork that everybody hates and he may or may not suffer from minor psychological scarring from the constant jokes about how he essentially could be replaced with a well-maintained spreadsheet.

The person who will run for secretary usually does it as an entry-level position onto exec board. This guy might have ambitions to be president someday, or he is a weird type of guy who gets a half-chub just at the thought of performing mindless tasks that would make any other person want to dive head-first into a bathtub full of scissors.

Treasurer

The guy who runs for treasurer is usually some sort of finance or accounting major. He probably wants desperately to prove his worthiness by showing that, yes, he can properly kick people in the ass to pay their dues. The candidate for treasurer usually proved to be awkward as all hell during his pledgeship and only survived cuts by the grace of God.

However, once elected, he usually can pull his shit together. Yeah, having a balanced budget is important, a concept that is still confusing to the federal government, however the most important job of the treasurer is to handle the “miscellaneous budget.” You might call it something else, but every chapter has one. Remember that time you were prepping for a rager and you thought, “Holy shit, we could really use like ten more kegs.” Then, as if by complete fucking magic, those twenty kegs appeared. Yeah, that was the miscellaneous budget. You’re welcome.

Risk Manager

I find the candidates for risk manager to be hilarious. They are either the most straight-edged, never-drank-a-day-in-their-life boners, or they are the prime example of the phrase “functioning alcoholic.” While the boner candidate will most likely go on and on about responsibly assigning sober drivers and reconsidering our stance on pledge education, the functioning alcoholic will most likely stumble in front of the chapter, disheveled and reeking of bourbon, to pronounce his amazing, fool-proof plan to reduce risk.

This plan, by the way, is not really a plan. It’s just seven and a half minutes of slurred speech, sexist jokes, innuendos about his junk and blatantly stating that his opponent is, in fact, a North Korean spy. Needless to say, this genius will get elected and spend most of his term as risk manager puking in the sink and passing out on the front lawn.

Vice President

The vice president, at least a good one, always has ambitions to be president. You will most likely see this tension playing out in chapter when he will try to push his twisted agenda like a dirty weasel. This will go on until the current president says, “Sit the fuck down, Dale. You’re not running chapter!” The vice president will slither back to his dark, damp cave and plot the day when he will wear the crown.

Or that could be bullshit. You might have a vice president who really is a great guy; he works hard and manages his committees well. He is a real team player and likes to see things get done. And maybe the only reason he isn’t president is because he was just a little too young or inexperienced.

President

The president, hands down, has the most stressful job. His job mainly consists of kicking out the assholes at chapter and explaining to the police, “No, officer, I don’t know how that got caught on fire.” While part of me feels bad that this kid is trapped under a constant waterfall of shit that would make Niagara Falls look like a leaky faucet, the other part of me doesn’t care and would really really like another beer.

The type of kid who would run for president starts out as an idealist who wants to see everybody get along and just act civilized. I guarantee by the end of his term, the president will have aged at least a decade and developed a pretty nasty case of IBS. This guy, who probably was the super pledge three years ago, will slowly turn into a cynical asshole who really really can’t believe you assholes are putting him through this shit…again.

All in all, electing a good president is important. There will inevitably come a day when your university’s conduct office will come knocking at your door with some unsubstantiated accusations and some awkward questions. They may ask some bullshit like, “Exactly how old were the girls?” or “You have written on your Pledge Education Plan, ‘team building activities’ quite a lot. Can you explain what those are?”

While you may not be the best guy to answer these particular inquiries, it is important that your president can avoid accusations like he were playing dodgeball. If you do things right, you will have a president who doesn’t take any shit and is familiar with the term “circumstantial evidence.” You will be better off because of it.