The sorority of Alpha Kappa Alpha, Inc. has once again raised $1 million to aid historically Black colleges and universities.
The 1908-founded Greek-letter organization collected the funds within 24 hours beginning on Monday, Sept. 16, as part of HBCU Impact Day. By the next day, AKA announced on Twitter that the organization had hit its fundraising goal for the second consecutive year.
“Alpha Kappa Alpha raised $1 million for HBCUs for the second year in a row! Our nation’s HBCUs will receive an endowment from AKA. We thank everyone who contributed to this $1 million day campaign. Let’s continue to support our HBCUs. #SupportHBCUs #AKA1MILLION1DAY #Excellence” read the post.
Many celebrated the results online.
“Beautiful! 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽”
“Awesome!!!!!”
“In the words of a Dear Friend of Mine ‘We all We Got💕'”
And the international organization’s president, Dr. Glenda Glover, told Madam Noire the funds “can help schools reduce student debt through scholarships, fund industry-specific research, recruit and retain top faculty, and much more.”
It’s the latest in an initiative launched in 2018 by Glover to support HBCUs through financial endowments.
“As a college president, I need to recognize the need for HBCUs. I need to recognize the operating needs, and the financial needs because we need funds to survive,” said the international president of AKA, who also heads Tennessee State University, an HBCU, in a statement issued to the National Newspaper Publishers Association Newswire. “I asked my membership to support this initiative. We galvanized members, individuals, and corporate sponsors. We kept going back again, and again.”
That initiative, which involves the goal to gift $10 million to HBCUs, will run through 2022. Back in February, the 111-year-old organization pledged $1.6 million to 32 HBCUs from their AKA-HBCU Endowment Fund, which is a partnership with the Educational Advancement Foundation. Part of that funding — $100,000 to be exact — went toward Bennett College to help the school maintain its accreditation.
“We are honored to provide Bennett College with their full endowment immediately to support their fundraising goals,” Glover said at the time.
Mississippi Valley State University, Grambling State University and Wiley College are among the other HBCUs participating in the endowment effort.
Looking ahead, AKA has partnered with the NNPA to plan the organization’s 80th-anniversary celebration next year.
“When you need to know the positive stories – the real stories – about African Americans, then you understand our dependence on the Black Press for our news,” Glover said in a statement. “It is my honor to be a part of this. Alpha Kappa Alpha has been a partner to the Black Press even right here in Nashville with the Tennessee Tribune.”
