Sorority Herstory

Omega Phi Beta Sorority, Incorporated was founded on March 15, 1989 at the University at Albany, State University of New York. Seventeen dedicated women of various cultural and ethnic backgrounds came together to create an outlet for women to initiate change. The foundation was built to fight against the injustices historically suffered by our gender. As the first Latina-oriented organization in the history of the University at Albany, they struggled to establish our organization, our purpose and most importantly, a precedent.

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In under a year, Omega Phi Beta Sorority, Incorporated co-founded the Latino Greek Council at the University at Albany. This council served as a support system for those organizations that did not share the agenda or identified themselves with the already established councils at the University at Albany. The Latino Greek Council (LGC) has proven its sustenance as it has served as the framework and model for the Latino Greek Councils on a National level, ten years later.

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With an emphasis on community service and sisterhood, Omega Phi Beta immediately became a positive influence within the community at the University at Albany, as well as in the city of Albany. Realizing the importance of expanding our service we initiated membership education process and established a second chapter, the Beta Chapter at SUNY New Paltz in the Spring of 1991.

What brought together our prominent seventeen founders and what attracted those initial pledge classes, still attracts so many women today. Although our orientation is Latina, we are open to women of all cultural backgrounds and the diversity of our membership and interestingly the diversity of our seventeen founders' attests to this fact. Omega Phi Beta Sorority, Incorporated thrives on the diversity of its members and we attribute a lot of our success to our organization's ability to embrace each members' differences.

Omega Phi Beta Sorority, Inc. is heading towards its twenty sixth year of existence we can look back only with pride. In these years we have managed to serve and educate a multitude of communities, donated almost $25,000 to various AIDS charities, served thousands of hours and continued to excel in academic pursuits inclusive of recognition at various campuses as the sorority with the highest grade point average. Along our accomplishments within our communities we have managed to excel as a sisterhood by providing each other with unconditional support in professional and personal endeavors. Omega Phi Beta has been able to capture the true essence of sisterhood and we are eagerly open to extend our family to others.

Omega Phi Beta was established due to the desire of identifying with and establishing our culture as well as symbolizing order strength and unity. Our founders set their precedent and today, we as a whole stand alongside them and exemplify what our values of pride, honesty and beliefs of tradition and custom symbolize.