The brothers of the Alpha Eta Chapter of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Incorporated is hosted an award ceremony Sunday, to honor various organizations on campus, The Hill Awards in the Gaither Gymnasium.
This award show is primarily based on people’s choice as students here on Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University’s campus get the chance to vote for their favorite organizations based on the category they fall in.
This year the person who directed the event was Victor Chrispin, a fourth-year political science student from Jacksonville Fla., and a spring 2015 initiate of the Alpha Eta Chapter of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Incorporated.
“The Hill Awards was started last year in the spring of 2015 from the Ladies on the Royal Court of The Alpha Eta Chapter of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Inc. and the Hill Awards recognizes various student organizations, and student leaders for their hard work, dedication, commitment and sacrifices to the Students of Florida A&M University and our community,” Chrispin said.
He continued to express that this event definitely has done better since it first began.
“The Hill Awards has progressed a lot, last year it was done on a smaller scale, this year we were able to advance it by including more categories, acts and making the voting process more inclusive.”
The categories included: cultural awareness, best male service organization, best female service organization, most influential female student and most influential male student, among other categories.
Chrispin added that the categories were selected by members of the fraternity and organizations were nominated based on their respective categories.
The organizations nominated for best Cultural organization were the African Students Association, The Caribbean Student’s Association and The Haitian Cultural Club.
The Caribbean Student’s Association won this award for the second time in a row.
Haile Robertson, a second-year pre-occupational therapy major from West Palm Beach Fla., expressed the joy she felt when FAMU CSA was announced as the winner as well as how the future looks for CSA winning this accomplishment.
“I felt a sense of great pride and accomplishment when I heard the great news.
This award will show the students on this campus that we're HERE and we're accomplishing our number one goal; to spread cultural awareness. This will bring positive exposure to our org and encourage students to join a family that loves and cares for our respective countries,” said Robertson.
Queen of Orange and Green elect Ijeoma Ogala, best known as Ijay, a second-year architect major from Nigeria, received the “most influential female student” award.
She expressed that she feels extremely honored to be recognized in this way.
“I feel happy to have received this honor. I feel like FAMU has given me so much and I want to be an inspiration to the young men and women of FAMU 20 when they come in the fall. I intend on continuing to serve the school I love so much, diligently,” Ogala said.
There were 15 categories and winners in total.