Two Black Fraternities At Yale Have Just One Member Left, ‘A Lot Of Our History Has Been Lost’

Two Yale College college students are working to protect the legacy of their Black Greek-letter organizations because the final remaining members on campus.

Alejandro Rojas ’26 of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., and Keith Pemberton ’27 of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc. are the final remaining members of their organizations at Yale. With the college’s restricted information on the fraternities and the historical past of early Black students on the college, the 2 college students are working to protect their organizations’ legacies earlier than they graduate.

“A number of our historical past has been misplaced due to the shortage of documentation from Yale College,” Rojas instructed Yale Day by day Information. “Essentially, it was a difficulty with whether or not or not Yale acknowledged the standing of those college students. I really feel this duty to make it possible for this historical past is honored regardless of how Yale may not have honored it previously.”

In response to Rojas, Alpha Phi Alpha first established a presence at Yale within the Nineteen Seventies, predating the founding of the Afro-American Cultural Heart. In the course of the Nineteen Eighties and ’90s, the fraternity—chartered beneath the citywide Eta Alpha Lambda, which Rojas now leads as president—had practically 20 members on campus.

Because the oldest constantly lively Black group at Yale, the fraternity’s historical past has been difficult to hint, Rojas famous, because of the college’s restricted documentation. Earlier than 1970, many Black college students didn’t dwell on campus and have been listed in New Haven metropolis information fairly than Yale’s enrollment logs. Moreover, a number of chapter members weren’t recorded in yearbooks or class archives, leaving gaps within the historic document.

Since changing into chapter president, Rojas has been on a mission to uncover as a lot of the chapter’s historical past as attainable, even exploring archives at different universities, akin to Cornell and Howard. He cites different colleges like Brown and Harvard that every has just one Alpha member as properly.

“I don’t assume quite a lot of college students are conscious of that nor have they got the identical crucial to take action,” Rojas mentioned. “I believe our position is to encourage folks to acknowledge our historical past by way of denied historical past and by way of Black historical past.”

Pemberton shares Rojas’ dedication to preserving his fraternity’s legacy. As the only real member of Omega Psi Phi at Yale, he represents the citywide Epsilon Iota Iota chapter, based in 1922. Since its founding, about 9 Yale college students have joined the chapter, however earlier than Pemberton, it had gone 15 years and not using a Yale provoke.

He hopes his position as the one Omega on campus will create a pathway of accomplishment and scholarship for different Black males at Yale and in New Haven, a mission that aligns with Rojas.

“We’re undoubtedly not in search of folks simply to extend numbers,” Rojas mentioned of himself and Pemberton. “For us, it’s actually necessary to have a sure high quality of pupil who’s devoted to honoring the historical past in the identical ways in which we search to carry our personal perspective to it.”

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