S stands for...
 

Its sort of funny,

what the "S" stands for on the pin worn by brothers is said to the new brothers after the oath is taken, more or less when the explanation of the coat of arms, etc are given, but the information as to what the S stands for is open knowledge.

I know the cat is sort of out of the bag here and de facto we are somewhere in privacy between Delta Upsilon (guests openly invited to brotherhood ceremonies) and some of the other NIC fraternities, but should that piece of information be as openly shared as it is?

Randy

I've heard from reputable (staff) sources, (but can't verify) that Horton considered the greek letters: Beta Sigma Alpha for the, as of yet, unborn fraternity. They were discarded because their meaning would be transparent. The S on the service pin is also transparent, which leads to its being discussed as "open" knowledge.

If someone came up to me and asked, "What's the S stand for?" I think I would tell him/her to just think about it a bit. It would be simple enough to avoid explaining it. If s/he insisted, it would be the perfect opportunity to suggest joining! :P

While our fraternity does have a secret pledging and initiatory ritual, I've often seen brothers a bit more casual about it. Ex. historian's who are taking picures as soon as a ritual is over, before the equipment is packed.

However, our ritual is *not* "open" like DU's, and it shouldn't be treated that way. I know we've aired our (clean!) laundry in public in the past, but that's no reason we can't bring it in. If someone thinks s/he knows what the S means, or anything else, I'm not worried about it. Either s/he's got it right and knows a bit more about why I'm proud to be in APO, or not, and should be told so. That doesn't mean I would ever tell people about our rituals. To share what is expected to be held secret is both untrustworthy and unloyal to your brothers.

Our international fraternity is held together by many things. Primarilly though, it is our common dedication to being leaders, friends, and of service, as well as our common experiences in service projects, leadership development activities, fellowship, etc. *and* our rituals which create the unity which is APO.

</ramble>
Back to the question: I don't think that having the "S" be common knowledge hurts our organization. However, (unless its meaning is published or mentioned as "open" by APO somewhere) discussing it with non-brothers would be contrary to the principles of APO.

nlfns,
vijay

Yes, Horton did consider those letters and discarded them. Some early chapters actually formed themselves under those letter before they found out about APO and joined us.

And some schools the men formed a group under those letters to show stability to APO National and then applied to join the Fraternity. There wasn't a real Petitioning Process at the time the way there is now.

BTW, we're speaking of the 20s & 30s here.

Delta Chapter got started when a group of Eagle Scouts at what is now Auburn got together to form an Eagle Scout Fraternity, contacted the BSA National office and was pointed to APO, which they instead joined.

Agreed on Auburn, though I can't remember where I saw that (maybe the history book).

I think there were still Beta Sigma Alpha's forming for that purpose in the 1950s, but I'd be very surprised if this happened after Con-con.

However Local greek letter groups becoming chapters has happened much more recently. One of the new (1990s) charters in Western PA was a local co-ed fraternity that joined up.

Randy