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Paragon March 2025 |
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Upcoming Events April May July October |
| Thank You! |
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First off, we would like to thank the 50+ brothers who have already responded to our “Do You Want the Paragon Texted to your Phone?” missive on March 24 to confirm or correct their phone numbers. We appreciate your assistance in updating our records. If you missed that email or haven’t had a chance to respond yet, feel free to reply to this email to tell us your preferred phone number for text messages. We are still investigating the best way to text out the Paragon, but many of you told us you preferred emails, and rest assured we will keep those emails coming for you. Second, we would like to thank Russ Reynolds ‘88 for his generous donation to the Ohio Alpha Beta Alumni Association. Third, we would like to thank the ten current members of the Ernie Schmidt Club who are currently committed to making more than $7000 in annual donations to the Ohio Alpha Beta Alumni Association. You can follow the example of Brother Reynolds or our Ernie Schmidt Club members via our website. |
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| Join Us for Initiation |
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Initiation will be on Saturday, April 5 at Eldred Hall. The hall will be open at 10pm with Initiation to start around 11pm. No RSVP is needed for Initiation, but remember that by tradition the associate members believe Initiation will be at a later date, so please maintain the surprise if you see them beforehand. The undergraduate brothers have a tradition of treating our associate members to dinner out on the night of their initiation. This year dinner will be at Mallorca at 5:30pm on April 5. If you are interested in joining them, please RSVP to Rohan Kohli by Tuesday, April 1, at rxk672@case.edu. |
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| Join Us for Our Spring Work Weekend on April 11, 12 & 13 |
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We will kick the weekend off at Boss Dog Brewing Company in Cleveland Heights on Friday, April 11. Happy hour will start at 7:00pm with everyone covering their own costs. Please RSVP via our website. The projects will begin on Saturday, April 12 and continue on Sunday, April 13. If possible, please RSVP for one or both days on our website. Even if you can’t help out, we’d love for you to drop in, say hello, meet the undergraduates and check out what we’ve done so far and hear more about what we plan to do in the future. The exact projects executed will depend on the number of people who RSVP on the website, but we have a bunch of contenders. We have a bathroom to start renovating, a shower to demolish, two bedrooms to rough in with water resistant materials, some bricks to repoint, trim to complete and new electrical to install – and all that is just in the basement! We have a plan to correct some longstanding issues with the doors to the chapter room. We will also do some yard work, clear out accumulated junk in the 30 yard dumpster we’ve rented, adjust some doors and generally get things done. We hope to see you there. If you can’t make it in April, be sure to mark your calendars for our Summer Work Weekend on July 19 and 20. One of the joys of a 110-year-old house that’s been occupied by us for 70 years is that we have plenty of things to keep us busy. If you can’t make it to help in person, you can support our efforts joining the Ernie Schmidt Club and helping ensure that the house lasts another 110 years! |
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| Big Brothers on the Website |
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In our last issue we called for brothers to send in their Black Book information to help fill out our Big Brother / Little Brother records. Mike Spisak ‘91 answered the call and enabled us to add another 8 pairs to our database. Thank you Mike! We’d love to get some more Black Book information to build out those records even farther. Speaking of those records, you can now view all of our family tree information on our website! If you go to our Family Tree page you can see the current statistics and view the trees two different ways. You can choose to pull down a PDF that shows each tree on its own page. Or you can pull down a single page PDF that shows every tree on one very large page, arranged roughly chronologically from top to bottom. And because they are PDFs, it’s easy to search for a specific name and see how they connect to the other brothers. We encourage you to check it out! If you cannot find your name anywhere on the trees, that means we don’t have you listed as either a Little Brother or a Big Brother. We would love to fix that, so if your info is lacking please respond to this email and tell us the name of your Big Brother and any Little Brothers, and we’ll get an update on the website in time for Founders Day. Similarly, if you see any other information that looks incorrect, let us know and we will do our best to fix it. Our “Biggest Brother” is still Dennis Kulpa ‘69. Every current undergraduate is in a family tree that connects up to Brother Kulpa via anywhere between 31 and 39 generations, and we would LOVE to push this back even farther. If you know Kulpa’s Big Brother, reach out and let us know! Many thanks are due to Nate Jacobsen ‘04 for developing the proof of concept for our online family trees and to Davey Rowan ‘01 for creating the version that is currently in use. |
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| Chapter Eternal |
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The passing of four of our brothers were reported in the Winter 2025 Case Alumnus Magazine.
The Ohio Alpha Beta Alumni Association extends its condolences to the family, friends and fraternity brothers of Brothers Bell, Josza, Seeman and Zifchak. May their memories be a blessing, and may they know peace. |
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| Meet the Board - Nick DeCenzo |
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In this issue we turn to our alumni board president. Nick DeCenzo grew up in Stow, Ohio. After starting his college career at Case, and joining Phi Kappa Theta in 1998, Nick eventually transferred to and graduated from The Ohio State University, earning a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration degree from OSU’s Fisher College of Business. While not a topic for polite discussion, politics has always been an important part of Nick’s life. While at Ohio State, Nick joined the College Democrats. After graduation, Nick became active in the Ohio Young Democrats and was elected to their executive board in 2007. In 2010, Nick was elected Great Lakes Region Director for the Young Democrats of America, and in 2013 was appointed YDA’s Communications Director. Nick met his girlfriend Amanda through YDA, and in 2022, when she was appointed to a position in the Biden administration, the moving vans were fired up once again so they could be together in our nation’s capital. In 2021, Nick was contacted by then-chapter President Tim Kill, asking for assistance. Nick helped organize a series of meetings that led to the resurrection of the Ohio Alpha Beta Alumni Association, which had been dormant since 2017. In addition to serving as Alumni President, Nick also chairs the Fundraising Committee, and built our current technology infrastructure, including our website, membership management platform, and file storage and sharing systems. Nick still works in consulting, specializing in SAP software. His old fashioned hobbies include golf, model railroading, and improving his cottage on the West Shore of Put-in-Bay.
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The Ohio Alpha Beta Alumni Association exists to connect the over 1000 alumni of the Phi Kappa Theta Ohio Alpha Beta chapter at Case Western Reserve University through events, newsletters, and other gatherings. Our subsidiary organization, the Ohio Alpha Beta Housing Corporation, exists to own, maintain, and improve the Ohio Alpha Beta Chapter House located at 11016 Magnolia Drive, Cleveland, OH, 44106. Please add @ohioalphabeta.org to your contact list to ensure delivery of the Paragon. https://www.ohioalphabeta.org/civicrm/mailing/optout/?reset=1&jid=&qid=&h=fakehash https://www.ohioalphabeta.org/civicrm/mailing/unsubscribe/?reset=1&jid=&qid=&h=fakehash 11016 Magnolia Dr
Cleveland, OH 44106 United States |
