Are you a Firefighter or a Carpenter? A few years ago, I submitted myself as a candidate for Member-At-Large of the Phi-Tau Zeta Alumni Association. I believed I had something worthwhile to contribute, and I was thrilled that I was elected. My term on the AA was a good experience; but not a great one. As many of you know, alumni advising in our chapter has usually consisted of the undergrads waiting until a problem is too big to handle, then dumping it on the alumni, who complain about the undergrads not getting the job done. Instead of an advisor, I found that I had become an alumni firefighter - and firefighting is dangerous work. Even if you do it well, you've still got a mess to clean up. Well, one definition of insanity is continuing to do the same thing you've been doing and hoping for a different result. So we're going to try something different. That something is an Alumni Advisory Board. Instead of groups of alumni advising groups of actives, we're going to try an individual alumnus advising an individual undergraduate officer. This is not a new idea. Lambda Chi Alpha actually has a manual and a training course which we intend to utilize. Hopefully, we will be able to team our undergraduate officers with skilled, experienced alumni whose advice can actually do them some good. Through one-on-one communication, we hope be able to work together to build up our fraternity, not just keep it from burning down. If you have some time and experience you're willing to give to a new generation of brothers, please continue.