“She’s what you might call a natural-born leader,” Ole Miss Phi Mu House Director Vicki Taylor said.
Taylor is talking about Phaedra Nicole Craig: a Georgia native, a third-generation Rebel and the first black president of the Phi Mu Alpha Delta chapter on campus.
Taylor worked as a house director at three other SEC schools before coming back to her alma mater in 2009. She also taught in the School of Business Administration for a few years. Around the house, she goes by Mama V.
“I’ve been really pleasantly surprised at how this sorority and campus in general has been open to diversity,” Mama V said. “It’s not like that everywhere.”
Mama V said she’s gotten to know Craig through her persistent leadership over the past two years. She said Craig is someone of integrity, whom people respect without her demanding it.
Craig is a junior integrated marketing communications major and said it felt like coming home when she came to Ole Miss freshman year from Suwanee, Georgia.
“I wanted to get out of my home state to go to college so I’d have the opportunity to have a full college experience in a new environment,” Craig said.
Her mother, Phyllis Crenshaw, is from Oxford and earned her undergraduate degree from Ole Miss. Former Chapter President Abby Cummings said she met Crenshaw at Phi Mu’s Officer Academy in 2016. She said Crenshaw is a sweet-spirited and encouraging woman.
“They have a very close relationship, and I know Ms. Phyllis is a big part of why Phaedra is the leader she is,” Cummings said.
Craig’s grandparents also earned their master’s and specialist’s degrees the university. She said her mom never joined a sorority while at school, so she didn’t feel much pressure to rush herself.
“I felt like a fish out of water when it came to recruitment,” Craig said. “I was kind of just optimistic about the whole thing.”
Craig grew up as the only child in her house after her older siblings had moved out. She said she went to a large high school and was looking for the comfort factor of a sorority. But even after pledging with Phi Mu, Craig said she didn’t expect to become president.
Sophomore year, Craig said her leadership blood took over. She applied for an executive position and ran unopposed to become her chapter’s director of harm reduction and prevention.
“I always wanted to do something with leadership to benefit other people,” Craig said.
In this first executive roll, Craig said she created many relationships with women in her sorority at the parties she had to oversee.
“I got to know a lot of different people in different pledge classes,” she said. “I was able to meet girls I never thought I’d grow relationships with.”
Then, Cummings was serving as the chapter’s president. Cummings said being president of a 400-person chapter is no easy job and she knew her successor would have to be confident yet self-aware.
“There was no doubt Phaedra was the girl for the job,” Cummings said.
When Cummings asked Craig if was interested in the president position, Craig said she thought she was kidding. She would soon run for the president position and win the chapter vote.
Mama V had been with the Alpha Delta chapter for seven years then and seen seven presidents walk through the halls, but never an African-American one.
“I’m proud that we’ve been able to have so many firsts for females on this campus,” Mama V said.
Kim Dandridge, the university’s first black female Associated Student Body president, was also a member of Phi Mu before she graduated in 2013. Craig said she is glad she now has her own opportunity to learn about and present ideas to other women on campus.
“I think that it helps girls like myself, minority girls, see that it is possible,” Craig said. “It might seem very one-sided, but you’ve got to find the chapter that brings out the best in you.”
Craig said she feels very honored and humbled the members of her chapter have given her the opportunity to lead them over the course of the next year.
She said her time at Ole Miss has been all about embracing the experience.
“There’s nothing wrong with dipping your foot into a pool you’ve never been in,” Craig said. “It could turn out to be the best decision you’ve ever made.”
