Provided

Fraternity members participate in the Positively Challenging program at Cornell Outdoor Education's Hoffman Challenge Course.

The Office of Fraternity and Sorority Affairs and Cornell Outdoor Education (COE) won the Association of Fraternity Advisors' 2008 Excellence in Educational Programming Award for the Positively Challenging program.

Positively Challenging is a collaborative effort to provide alternatives to hazing and alcohol abuse through leadership development opportunities to the fraternity and sorority community through adventure-based learning.

More than 500 Greeks from a dozen Cornell sororities and fraternities have participated over the past two-and-a-half years. Led by trained Cornell undergraduates, they use COE's Hoffman Challenge Course and ropes course. They also hike, climb and participate in retreats and teamwork activities. The goal, said Travis Apgar, the Robert G. Engel Associate Dean of Students, is to "redevelop traditions or rituals that may have involved hazing. When students experience challenges and obstacles, they become stronger."

"Cornell Outdoor Education's programs are phenomenal," said Kappa Sigma President Kyle Washington. "The real value of the experience, however, is the way the staff works with you to tailor the process to promote teambuilding and trust among your specific group members. They will help you pick the courses and activities that work best for you. We find that no matter how well we work together and know one another, we learn something new about each other and about ourselves by the time we leave the course."

Apgar said colleges and universities nationwide applied for the award. "We feel pretty honored to win," he said. "I'd love to see this program grow and to have every chapter at Cornell take part in it.