Chapter
Name:
Upsilon Iota National Founding: 1920 Chapter Founding: 1979 National Web Site:www.zphib1920.org/ Chapter Web Site: Official Colors: Royal Blue and Pure White Nickname: Zeta Philanthropy: Z-HOPE™: Zetas Helping Other People Excel, March
of Dimes, Stork's
Nest Prenatal Care Program, National Education
Foundation, Breast Cancer Awareness
Chapter President: Dominique Lucien
Zeta
Phi Beta Sorority, Inc. was founded on the simple belief that sorority elitism
and socializing should not overshadow the real mission for progressive organizations
- to address societal mores, ills, prejudices, poverty, and health concerns
of the day. Founded January 16, 1920, Zeta began as an idea conceived by five
coeds at Howard University in Washington D.C.: Arizona
Cleaver, Myrtle Tyler, Viola Tyler, Fannie Pettie and Pearl Neal. These
five women, also known as our Five Pearls, dared to depart from the traditional
coalitions for black women and sought to establish a new organization predicated
on the precepts of Scholarship, Service, Sisterly Love and Finer Womanhood.
It was the ideal of the Founders that the Sorority would reach college women
in all parts of the country who were sorority minded and desired to follow the
founding principles of the organization. Founder Viola Tyler was oft quoted
to say, "[In the ideal collegiate situation] there
is a Zeta in a girl regardless of race, creed, or color, who has high standards
and principles, a good scholarly average and an active interest in all things
that she undertakes to accomplish."
Since
its inception, the Sorority has chronicled a number of firsts. Zeta Phi Beta
was the first Greek-letter organization to charter a chapter in Africa (1948);
to form adult and youth auxiliary groups; to centralize its operations in
a national headquarters; and to be constitutionally bound to a fraternity,
Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Incorporated.
Zeta's
national and local programs include endowment of its National Educational
Foundation, community outreach services and support of multiple affiliate
organizations. Zeta chapters and auxiliary groups have given untotaled hours
of voluntary service to educate the public, assist youth, provide scholarships,
support organized charities and promote legislation for social and civic change.
