.From Idea to National Movement: Phi Sigma Rho Celebrates 40 Years
Over the past 40 years, Phi Sigma Rho has grown from an idea to a national organization for women engineers that stands on the pillars of friendship, scholarship and encouragement – and it all began with a conversation on the sixth floor of Shreve Hall in the fall of 1983.
Abby (McDonald) Schwartz was frustrated. Growing up, she had heard stories from her father and grandfather about how their membership in Triangle Fraternity had helped them make friends and persevere through their engineering classes at Purdue. Schwartz wanted a similar experience – and while there were organizations for women engineers on campus, there simply wasn’t one that allowed women to adequately balance their social lives with rigorous academic studies. That night, she went down the hall to talk to her friend, Rashmi (Khanna) Drummond, and vent.
“It turned out that one of the first formal recruitment nights for sororities was the same night as a physics test,” Abby said. “I was frustrated about why they make it so hard for women in engineering to join a sorority. I came down to Rashmi’s room and I was lamenting about why we don’t have something like that – and the rest is history.” 
Drummond wasn’t planning to join a sorority because she didn’t think it would allow her the balance she needed to pursue her degree – but she also wanted to socialize, make friends and have fun. The next day, Schwartz was back in Drummond’s room with the idea that became Phi Sigma Rho.
“We were commiserating about how silly it was that we didn’t have access to a support network like the men in Triangle did,” Drummond recalled. “I thought we were venting and that was it. Lo and behold, I got a glimpse of Abby’s determination because the next day she knocked on my door again and said she’d gone to the Dean of Students and figured out how we could start our own organization. That’s how we started.”
Creating a sorority from scratch required persistence, dedication and creativity. Selecting a name was one of the first orders of business. The two went to the library, sifted through a paper directory of all the fraternities and sororities in the US, and referenced a Greek dictionary to learn words and letters that represented the values that would become the pillars of the sorority. For example, Phi was selected because filía, the Greek word for friendship, begins with the letter. Overall, it took a year for the two to determine rules and create all the documentation necessary to formalize the founding of the sorority.
At the beginning of fall 1984, the sorority was open to new members. Drummond and Schwartz wrote advertisements for a callout on whiteboards and shared their ideas with women in other engineering organizations in hopes of attracting their first members. 
“We showed up to that first callout and we really didn’t know if anyone else would be there – and they were!” Drummond said. “I don’t remember how many showed up to the call out, but it was such a diverse room of women. There were all majors and backgrounds. It was so validating that other people thought this was a good idea.”
From that meeting came the Alpha class of Phi Sigma Rho, which consisted of 10 members. Then came the next challenges – growing and sustaining the organization, defining its culture, refining rules and creating the rituals and traditions that give a sorority its unique identity.
“It’s things you don’t think about,” explained Drummond. “How do you turn an organization into a sisterhood, a sorority? That’s where we did a lot of soul searching and realized it’s the rituals. We were not a 100-year-old organization that could fall back on our history for rituals. We had to create them. We wanted to be more than an organization and have more of a bonding and support system.”
As the sorority grew, the women developed the bonds of sisterhood they craved. While Phi Sigma Rho didn’t have their own house, many of the women rented apartments or homes together and the social structure of the sorority created opportunities to celebrate their successes or find understanding support to persevere through challenges.
“We’d walk into our classes and we might be the only women in the room, but we could come back where we had support,” Drummond said. “We’d cry on each other’s shoulders when we got a seven out of a hundred on an exam – and that’s a real, true story! We were there to lift each other up or commiserate about the difficulty of the curriculum and not having a lot of other women around us. It was that encouragement that really gave us our community.”
Momentum and validation of the community being built in Phi Sigma Rho spread quickly. It wasn’t long before a group of women at Ohio State University approached the sorority about forming their own chapter. Schwartz, Drummond and their sisters then got to work to further define aspects of sorority culture, rituals, rules and more that would be applicable at a national level, and which aspects of sorority life would be left up to individual chapters.
Professionals in engineering industries also began to take note of the sorority. Many sisters began returning from their summer internships with donations to support the organization. On campus, fraternal organizations began to include the sorority in organizational and social functions. Some milestones marked the way – the first social event with a fraternity, recognition by the Purdue Panhellenic Association, setting up a table to meet with students on Slayter Hill and more. 
“We always wanted to be real,” Schwartz said. “We always wanted to be taken seriously and have people understand that we weren’t just making something up.”
The momentum has continued to build to the present day. Forty years after the founding of Phi Sigma Rho, the sorority boasts 51 chapters around the nation and more than 11,000 alumnae. Purdue’s Alpha Chapter has the highest membership of any chapter, typically ranging from 120 – 150 members following recruitment. Boilermakers of the Alpha Chapter benefit from the same values and community that Schwartz and Drummond worked to instill in the organization while the sorority continues evolve.
A new experience afforded to today’s sisters is the opportunity to live together in a dedicated sorority house. The Alpha Chapter is one of the only Phi Sigma Rho chapters to own a house. For current Alpha Chapter president Olivia Vassios, living in the house is a significant benefit of membership.
“It’s an unreal experience having 60-plus of your best friends living under the same roof,” Vassios said. “Going into recruitment freshman year, I was a little worried about living in a house with so many people – but it’s so much fun! There’s always someone around to support me. Knowing I have all of these people to fall back on when I need it has been really awesome and special.”
Phi Sigma Rho pairs older sorority sisters (bigs) with younger members (littles) to share support and guidance and strengthen the bonds of sisterhood. The tradition of big/little reveals and the ensuing bonds formed in those relationships are a core aspect of the Phi Sigma Rho experience. Vassios says she was inspired to pursue her leadership position by her big, the former president of the chapter.
“I saw the big impact she had on our chapter and I wanted to do the same thing,” Vassios said. “My little is amazing too- she’s one of our new member educators. I think that connection you have with your big and little is so special. I just have a younger brother at home and I come from a big extended family, but there are only two other girls. Outside of those two, I’d never had that sister bond with someone, so getting that here is really special.”
Beyond the bonds of sisterhood, the sisters of Phi Sigma Rho support the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society in their philanthropic endeavors. A Phi Sigma Rho sister, Stacy McKay, was diagnosed with leukemia during her time at Purdue and died after a battle with the disease in 1995. Today’s sisters carry forth her memory by supporting the society with fundraising events such as Phi Rho Phloats, which features root beer floats, and other endeavors throughout the year. Additional traditional chapter events include a fall semi-formal and spring formal, often held away from campus.
In addition to the impact still being created on campus and among sisters within a chapter, alumnae from across the nation ensure a supportive network that lasts a lifetime. A national Facebook group is active with daily posts ranging from job opportunities and advice on how to work with a difficult boss to recommendations on the best steel-toed boots for work. These connections are perhaps best felt at national conferences, which Drummond and Schwartz make a point to attend regularly. Schwartz has also served as an alumni advisor to the Alpha Chapter executive board in the past, and the founding members make it a point to stop by the house when they’re on campus.
No matter the connection point, Schwartz and Drummond feel a tremendous sense of pride in what they’ve started – particularly when they meet fellow Phi Sigma Rhos. They take particular pride in the fact that the sorority is home for women of such diverse backgrounds.
“When we walked into the 25th anniversary, the room was full of women of all backgrounds,” Schwartz said. “This celebration was a beautiful rainbow of people and that has always been one of the things I’ve been most proud of. We have a common goal of scholarship, friendship and encouragement and that’s what we emphasize.”
Looking ahead to the next 40 years, founders and sisters of all ages look forward to continuing to grow membership at the house and national level. Members emphasize a need to continue to build the sorority’s reputation among companies and expand the alumni base from 11,000 to 100,000 and beyond. The Alpha Chapter’s house provides additional opportunities to host women from chapters at other universities to further strengthen regional and national bonds. The Alpha Chapter hosted women from the University of Illinois-Champaign chapter during their Homecoming and 40th anniversary event.
No matter what giant leaps Phi Sigma Rho may take in the future, the culture, connections and values can all be traced back to the initial small step of a conversation in Shreve Hall, as well as the determination of its two founding members and ensuing generations of sisters.