Phi Theta Kappa
Rocky Mountain-Cascade Region

In the early 1980s, Marie Mueller was asked by one of her business students, Diane Foisy, to become the Phi Theta Kappa advisor. At that time both of the advisors were going on a sabbatical leaving the students with no adult coverage. Marie talked with the dean and received release time and funding to be Rogue Community College's Alpha Zeta Pi chapter advisor.

By 1982-83, the Alpha Zeta Pi chapter had been in existence for some time, and Marie attended a "regional meeting" at Lane Community College with 3-4 students. At that time the region was completely unorganized. It was not following the procedures and policies of Phi Theta Kappa International. There was no constitution; there were no bylaws; there was no means of accurate financial accounting (the "coordinator" had appointed his wife as regional treasurer, and she was a student); and there were no procedures to formalize any activity.

The Alpha Zeta Pi presdient was a business major and took on this problem. She was very assertive, and the chapter challenged the regional "coordinator" about everything. He had no answers. "Why?" was answered by "That's how we do it."

When Marie returned to Grants Pass, it became her job to do something to solve the problem. She wrote to International, and they sent Billy Williams to meet with interested chapters at Rogue CC. The meeting was not pleasant, but all concerns were addressed. At that point there was no regional entity, and no regional coordinator.

Somehow Marie was appointed coordinator. (She thinks it may have been through default as there were few chapters in existence at the time.) Marie Mueller became the regional coordinator from 1983-1990, and she was also the local chapter advisor as well.

Marie made sure that a constitution and bylaws were drafted immediately--requiring lots of phone calls and snail mails! Marie becan contacting community college presidents to ask if they were interesting in initiating a chapter. If anyone said yes, Marie took a group of student to a meeting of interested parties. There they were with a "dog and pony show" selling the value of Phi Theta Kappa. As a result, chapters were initiated at several colleges, and other colleges becan working on ways to begin or rejuvenate a defunct chapter while Marie was coordinator. Marie and her students also made sure that chapters on the edges of other states--namely in California, Washington, and Idaho, knew that they were welcome to attend Oregon events.

In sheer self-defense Marie designed a handbook for our region. She could see by the repeated questions that much information was not getting through to the chapter officers. That was partly because colleges did not cough up enough funds to send members to the regional and international meetings, but it was also because some advisors were not telling their officers what they needed to know. Rogue CC footed the bill for printing the handbooks, which were then distributed to officers in attendance at meetings where Marie was also in attendance. (Many of the features Marie implemented in the handbook are still used today!)

Any regional meeting that Marie organized had a training session for advisors, Question and Answer format, review of handbooks, suggestions for fundraising, the importance of attending regional and international meetings, etc. Marie helped establish an expection for "how to" workshops for new officers and members, usually presented by the current officers. When Marie encountered a "blank," she always did a "how to" on the subject. She always tried for a comfortable venue with really good food and something fun to do nearby. There was also always a way for students, officers, or advisors to ask Marie questions or make suggestions for things to put in the handbook or to be presented at the next conference.

According to Marie, the hardest part of being a coordinator was teaching four classes and editing accrditation documents while being an advisor and coordinator. Her absolutely most challenging activity was to establish the region under the aegis of Phi Theta Kappa International, along with suitable procedures, a constitution, bylaws, etc.

According to Marie:

"It was a very satisfying job to see the region growing and developing, with dedicate new advisors (like Dave Arter) who took responsible attitudes toward student involvement in and benefits from PTK membership. The conferences were a lot of fun, and the students and advisors were great people to work with.

In 1991, Dave Arter became the regional coordinator for the Oregon Region. There were still very few chapters in the region, and California was a part of the region as well. When California became its own region, the chapter at The College of the Siskiyous in Weed remained with our region because it was the only chapter in norther California. As other chapters were formed in the northern part of the state, that chapter switched to be a part of the California region. The reason our region is so spread out is because there are too few chapters within each state for each state to stand on its own as a region. That is why our region remains a combination of Southern Idaho, Utah, and Oregon.

The oldest chapter in the region was decommissed about ten years ago. It was Kappa Zeta at Central Oregon. The oldest chapter still chartered is Kappa Chi at OIT. The oldest active chapter is Omicron Xi at the College of Southern Idaho, followed by Omicron Phi at Treasure Valley CC, Pi Phi at Clatsop CC, Rho Theta at Rogue CC, and Sigma Zeta at Lane CC.

In the 1990s there was a flurry of charterings, adn that is when most of the rest of our region's chapters were formed. The most recent chapter is Beta Epsilon Gamma at PCC's Cascade Campus.

When the chapter in Utah started to become active, Headquarters suggested we might want to change our name, but the Utah chapters did not want to. Several years later when Headquarters tried again, the region decided to change the name.

In the mid to late 1990s Dave and others made a push to establish Phi Theta Kappa scholarships in the region. Mike Watson, at that time Associate Director, and Dave spent two days traveling the state talking to colleges and universities. They had no luck with the state schools, but a number of private colleges signed on: Western Baptist College, Willamette University, University of Portland, Concordia College (now Concordia University), Pacific University, and Lewis and Clark College. The University of Idaho also signed on.

In 1994, Sue Vandewilt, Regional President from Weed, initiated the regional meeting grant program to assist the outlying chapters in attending regional meetings.

Currently regional records only run until 1994, and here are the regional presidents going back to then:

To be continued...

(If you have information about our region's history or photos, please send them to us.)