Our Five Illustrious Pearls
Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc. was founded on January 16th, 1920 at Howard University in Washington, D.C. Established by five coeds: Arizona Cleaver, Fannie Pettie, Myrtle Tyler, Viola Tyler, and Pearl Neal. These women believed that a sorority grounded in elitism and socializing overshadowed the real mission for progressive organizations and failed to address fully the societal mores, ills, prejudices, and poverty affecting humanity in general and the black community in particular. They sought to design a sorority which would directly affect positive change, raise consciousness of their people, encourage the highest standards of scholastic achievement, and foster a greater sense of unity among its members.
Comprised of a diverse membership of more than 120,000 college-educated women in 800 chapters that span globally, members of this great organization have sought to maintain a rich legacy of programming and activities to strengthen and empower the communities that we serve. Zeta women are trailblazer and have achieved many "first":
- The first and only constitutionally bound to a fraternity, Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc.
- The first to charter a chapter in Africa
- The first to have youth and adult auxiliary groups
- The first to host a convention in the segregated South
- The first organization to organize within a centralized national office along with a paid staff
- The first to charter a chapter in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates and Belgium.
To learn more about Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., visit the National Website:
http://www.zphib1920.org