Chapters to support DOJ $1 Million Grant

DEVELOPING LEADERS BY SERVING OUR YOUTH.

Alpha Phi Alpha, the world’s oldest intercollegiate fraternity founded by African-American men, announced today that it was providing sub-award grants to forty of its chapters (representing twenty-eight geographic regions), as a part of the expansion of its 93-year-old mentoring program, Go-To-High-School, Go-To-College. Strengthened by a $1 million grant from the United States Department of Justice that it received in October of this year, the fraternity will directly serve more than 1,000 young black and Latino youths, while indirectly serving an additional 45,000 young people, ages 6–17 years old, in urban areas across the country. As a key component of this national program, currently implemented in each of the organization’s 700 chapters throughout the country and around the globe, members of the fraternity will connect these at-risk and high-risk students with a caring adult mentor, while providing them with resources and one-to-one and group mentoring opportunities aimed at reducing truancy and increasing graduation rates among the program participants.

Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity develops leaders and promotes brotherhood and academic excellence, while providing service and advocacy for underserved communities. Since 1922, the fraternity has committed itself to mentoring young boys and men of color in ways that lead to meaningful change in their lives and the communities from which they hail through the implementation of its historic mentoring initiative. The precursor to all of the successful mentoring programs designed specifically with young Black males in mind, Go-To-High-School, Go-To-College has helped countless young people enter the social and economic mainstream.

“Although, collectively, high school students overall are graduating at a rate higher than ever before, and some say that there are signs that the achievement gap is incrementally closing, minority students still lag behind the national average in getting a high school diploma. Alpha men will continue to raise the collective consciousness of our nation, whether it is in the streets protesting detrimental policies that adversely affect the disenfranchised or mentoring young men one-on-one, the need to strengthen and, indeed, expand Go-To-High-School, Go-To-College has never been more prescient,” said General President Mark S. Tillman, the fraternity’s international president.

In recent statements echoing those remarks, United States Attorney General Loretta Lynch declared, “Real change is spearheaded by those who are grappling with real problems every day. Our goal is to also tap into the innovative programs and exciting ideas that are emerging from communities across the country.”

Additional information about the fraternity and the Go-To-High-School, Go-To-College program may be found at our website by visiting www.apa1906.net.

For more information, please email GHSGC-Grant@apa1906.net. Thank you.