Dear Zeta Family,
With great sadness, we want you to know our beloved Executive Director Deb Ensor passed away this morning (Friday, July 18), in a hospice care center in Indianapolis after a courageous battle with ovarian cancer. Her brother, Patrick, and her ZTA sisters were by her side.
Deb, 59, served ZTA as Executive Director for 29 years and as a Traveling Leadership Consultant (1976-1978), Administrative Assistant (1978-1980) and Director of Operations (1980-1983). She worked for Electronic Data System as Campus Relations Manager from 1983 to 1985 before returning to the ZTA staff as Executive Director.
Her leadership, vision and passion shaped the growth and development of Zeta Tau Alpha. She served under 13 National Presidents who valued her insight and encouragement. Deb lived the values of our Creed every day and inspired thousands of ZTA members to “Seek the Noblest.” She loved and respected the fraternity/sorority experience and its ability to make a difference; her influence reached beyond ZTA into the larger circle of fraternal leaders and university administrators.
Deb’s legacy to ZTA began in 1974 at the 50th anniversary of Beta Gamma Chapter at Florida State University. Beta Gamma was struggling with declining membership, but when National President Martha C. Edens met Deb, a recent initiate, she immediately recognized her potential as a leader and motivator and asked her to work with National Council to “save her chapter.” Deb became Pledge Trainer (now New Member Coordinator) and later President of Beta Gamma and restored her chapter as a leader at FSU.
Her experience as a collegian cultivated Deb’s heart for helping struggling chapters achieve greatness. After graduation, she served two years as a Traveling Leadership Consultant for ZTA. As a result, Deb became a strong advocate for the TLC program and its ability not only to assist chapters, but also to develop future leaders for the Fraternity. Today, ZTA has the largest team of traveling consultants in the Greek world, and dozens of former TLCs serve as National Officers. One of the last photographs taken of Deb at the 2014 ZTA Convention was the gathering of former TLCs—a photo opportunity she never missed.
Deb traveled extensively for ZTA during her years at Executive Director, and her visits to collegiate chapters were often prompted by struggles or concerns within the chapter. While her arrival at a chapter may have made members anxious and nervous, her visits always resulted in motivation, inspiration and a stronger sisterhood. Deb had an unprecedented ability to correct a chapter’s behavior while encouraging its members to change for the better and embrace ZTA’s principles by doing the right thing, for the right reasons, all the time.
Deb’s dedication to our Fraternity values led to the development of ground-breaking and innovative programming over the past four decades, including A Matter of Balance; Challenges and Choices; Stand up!, Stand out! (with Kappa Delta Fraternity); My Sister, My Responsibility; Crowning Achievements and Behind Happy Faces. She championed the implementation of GreekLifeEduTM as a required harm reduction tool for our chapters and MentalHealthEduTM for our advisors and volunteers.
Deb received each of ZTA’s highest honors, including the Certificate of Merit and Honor Ring, as well as the Louise Kettler Helper Award as the Fraternity’s exceptional alumna (Centennial Convention in 1998) and the Vivian Ulmer Smith Recruitment Award (1994). Her recruitment skills spurred the growth of old and new chapters. On recruitment visits, Deb was both fun and serious. She lent her musical talents to skits and taught chapters new chants, while encouraging them to implement values-based membership selection. On ZTA’s Extension Team, Deb was the “closer.” She had the ability and poise to answer tough questions from university administrators and articulate what ZTA would contribute to a new campus. As a result, ZTA experienced unprecedented growth in reactivations and installations in the last decade.
As Vice President of Philanthropy for the ZTA Foundation from 1992 to 1998, Deb championed our Creed’s call to prepare for service and learn the nobility of serving. She encouraged the Foundation to sponsor the Survivor Recognition Program at Race for the Cure® events and coined the phrase, Think Pink®, now a trademark of the Foundation and the tagline for our breast cancer education and awareness efforts.
Over the years, Deb became a valued member of the interfraternal world. She sincerely believed ZTA had an obligation “to be true to ourselves” and “to those within and without our circle.” While Deb served as Foundation Vice President of Development (1998 to present), ZTA provided funding to distribute My Sister, My Responsibility to every campus with a fraternity/sorority community; award five $10,000 grants to campuses for innovative hazing prevention programs; develop AdvanceU online learning for student life professionals; and sponsor the highest donor level of HazingPrevention.org. She received the Susan Kraft Fussell Distinguished Service Award from the Association of Fraternity/Sorority Advisors in 2009; became the first Executive Director to be part of a National Panhellenic Conference delegation in 2006; and served the Fraternity Executives Association as Secretary-Treasurer, President-Elect and President.
Outside of ZTA, Deb loved sports, especially her Florida State Seminoles, the Indiana Pacers, the Indianapolis Colts and the Indianapolis 500.
Deb was a trusted friend and confidant to ZTA’s National Council, a mentor and role model to hundreds of Traveling Leadership Consultants and National Officers, an inspiration to aspiring collegiate leaders, and a motivator to all who were privileged to experience her dynamic public speaking skills and beautiful singing voice. Just three weeks before her death, she delighted the ZTA Convention in Los Angeles with her singing of “I Was Here.” The lyrics now have a special significance to those in attendance:
“I want to do something that matters, say something different, something that sets the whole world on its ear. I want to do something better with the time I’ve been given. I want to try to touch a few hearts in this life and leave nothing less than something that say: I was here.”
Whether you knew her as Debbie like her Beta Gamma sisters, Margaret D. like some of her best friends, Ms. Ensor like collegians or just Deb; she touched your heart and you knew—and will always remember—she was here.
Deb is survived by her mother, Margaret R. Ensor; her brother, Patrick Ensor; and her nephew, Eli Ensor. Her father, Michael Emory Ensor, preceded her in death. No services will be held at this time. We plan to hold a celebration of Deb’s life in the fall and will announce those plans to our membership when they are finalized.
The Fraternity, Foundation and Fraternity Housing Corporation have established the Deb Ensor Endowed Fund. We ask those wishing to pay tribute to Deb’s legacy make a donation to this fund through the Foundation, rather than send flowers. (You may use the
www.zetataualpha.org/donate and indicate Deb Ensor Endowed Fund in the Special Instructions box.)
You are welcome to forward this tribute to Deb to others. She touched thousands of lives, and as she sang at many ZTA meetings and events, “because we knew her, we have been changed for good.”
Zeta Love,
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Carolyn Hof Carpenter
National President
Becky Hainsworth Kirwan
ZTA Foundation President
Julia Marthaler Hill
ZTA Fraternity Housing Corporation President
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3450 Founders Road
Indianapolis, IN 46268
Phone: (317) 872-0540
www.zetataualpha.org
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