About Alpha Kappa Alpha
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated was founded on January 15, 1908 at Howard University in Washington, D.C., and became the first Greek-lettered organization created by and for black women. The sorority’s founder, Ethel Hedgeman Lyle, was inspired by two of her professors to establish a society that encouraged scholarship, friendship and service. She and a group of eight other distinguished ladies worked together to ensure the sorority’s implementation. This group consisted of Anna Easter Brown, Beulah and Lillie Burke, Marjorie Hill, Margaret Flagg-Holmes, Lavinia Norman, Lucy Diggs Slowe, and Marie Woolfolk-Taylor. On February 21, 1908, seven members of the class of 1910 were inducted into the organization. Together with the 9 original founders, Joanna Berry Shields, Norma Elizabeth Boyd, Ethel Jones Mowbray, Sarah Meriweather Nutter, Alice P. Murray, Carrie Snowden, and Harriet Josephine Terry along with the incorporators Julia Brooks, Nellie Quander, Nellie Pratt Russell, and Minnie B. Smith these women became what are known as the 20 Pearls of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated.
Our Purpose
Since our founding over a century ago, Alpha Kappa Alpha’s purpose has been to cultivate and encourage high scholastic and ethical standards, to promote unity and friendship among college women, to study and help alleviate problems concerning girls and women in order to improve their social stature, to maintain a progressive interest in college life, and to be of “Service to All Mankind.”
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