Alpha Kappa Alpha was founded at Howard University in Washington, D.C., becoming the first Greek-letter organization established by African American college women.
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated was founded on January 15, 1908, at Howard University in Washington, D.C., by Ethel Hedgeman Lyle and eight other academically driven Black women. It holds the distinction of being the first Greek-letter organization established by African American college women, predating the founding of any other Black sorority in the United States.
At a time when Black women faced the compounded barriers of racial segregation and gender discrimination, and when higher education for African Americans was itself a hard-won privilege, the founders sought to create a supportive sisterhood centered on scholarship, service, and the uplift of the Black community. The sorority's founding came just decades after the end of slavery and during the height of Jim Crow segregation, making the act of Black women organizing publicly and formally for intellectual and civic purposes a quietly radical act.
AKA was incorporated in 1913, cementing its permanence and legal standing. From its Howard University roots, the organization expanded into a national and later international body with hundreds of thousands of members organized into collegiate and graduate chapters ("Ivy Leaves") across the United States and abroad.
The founding established a template followed by subsequent Black Greek-letter organizations comprising the "Divine Nine," and it launched a legacy of service, activism, and mentorship that has spanned more than a century, touching fields from civil rights to public health to politics, most visibly with member Kamala Harris's rise to the U.S. vice presidency.