Alpha Kappa Psi

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Alpha Kappa Psi Fraternity ΑΚΨ


Official Name	Alpha Kappa Psi Fraternity
Nickname	AKPsi
Founded	October 5, 1904 at New York University
Incorporated	May 20, 1905 in New York 1997 in Indiana
International Headquarters	Indianapolis, Indiana
Chapters and Colonies	197 Chapters
Total Initiates	Over 230,000
Collegiate Members	10,000
Colors	Navy and Gold
Official Flower	Yellow Rose
Official Jewel	Blue Sapphire
The Six Main Objects of The Fraternity’s Coat of Arms	Ten-point star, Pair of Balances, Phoenician Galley, The Motto, Coin bag, Chain of four links
Vision Statement	Alpha Kappa Psi is recognized as the premier developer of principled business leaders
Core Principles	Brotherhood, Knowledge, Integrity, Service, Unity
AKPsi’s Tag Line	Alpha Kappa Psi—Shaping People, Shaping Business
Unofficial Mottos	"Join us Now or work for us Later" "Mixing Business with Pleasure since 1904"
Address	Alpha Kappa Psi Fraternity 7801 East 88th Street Indianapolis, IN 46256-1233
Alpha Kappa Psi Website

ΑΚΨ (Alpha Kappa Psi) is a co-ed professional business fraternity. The Alpha Kappa Psi Fraternity was founded on October 5, 1904 at New York University, and was incorporated on May 20, 1905. It is currently headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana.

1 History
- 1.1 Women in AKΨ
2 Statistics & Trivia
3 Objectives
4 Notable Alumni
5 Chapters
6 External links

[edit] History

The story of Alpha Kappa Psi Fraternity begins at New York University, Washington Square, New York. After the passage of the Certified Public Accountants Act of 1896 in New York State, an increasingly urgent demand arose for adequate education in all branches of higher accountancy. There also developed an important calling known as the profession of administration. To meet this double need for higher commercial education and for a college of accountancy, the Council of New York University decided to establish a school on a broad basis of advanced instruction in political economy, accounting, and commercial law.

On July 28, 1900, the Chancellor of New York University, Henry Mitchell MacCracken, authorized the opening of the new evening School of Commerce, Accounts, and Finance on the same basis as the seven other traditional schools and colleges of the university. The Financial Record for September 12, 1900 asserted "the new school raises accounting from an avocation to a profession and places the accountant on the same plane as the lawyer and the physician." The school's establishment on October 2, 1900 was directly traceable to forceful insistence on the part of the New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants for university instruction in the sciences immediately connected with practical life. The October 13, 1900 issue of the New York Post indicated that the setting up of this school is "generally regarded as one of the most significant signs of the times...It is recognized that a specialized higher education...is inevitable, because more and more demanded."

The official announcement of the School of Commerce stated its objects, "to elevate the standards of business education and to furnish a complete and thorough course of instruction in the higher professional accountancy." At first there was a roster of 62 matriculates. Study extended over a two year period, with classes held from 8 to 9 and 9 to 10 o'clock Monday through Friday evenings for eight months a year. At the outset it was uncertain whether a university degree would accompany the diploma offered by the school. Then the School of Commerce at New York University became the first to offer a degree in a night school in business.

Prime movers behind the school included Charles Waldo Haskins, senior member of Haskins and Sells and President of the State Society of Certified Public Accountants; Leon Brummer, Secretary of that Society; and Dr. Charles Ezra Sprague, President of the Union Dime Savings Bank. All three men joined the faculty of the school. Haskins was appointed its first dean, but he lived only long enough to see the institution fairly well established on the road to success. At the beginning, the school was burdened with the manifold problems of organization. Fourteen courses were offered to the enrolled students by the faculty of fourteen members. Proper college textbooks as known today had not yet been written.

In the fall of 1902, after the university had awarded the first of the new degrees in business, a stronger basis for instruction was introduced, more faculty members were added, and the curriculum was enlarged and correlated anew. The group that entered in 1902 was the first three-year class working toward the Bachelor of Commercial Science degree. Then all students took the same subjects. The first year had demonstrated the need for a strong administrator to concentrate his full time and energy on the development of the school. The man chosen for this position was Joseph French Johnson; previously he had for eight years been Professor of Finance at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. In 1901 he accepted the post of Secretary of the Faculty at the NYU. School, and in 1903 he became its second Dean and Professor of Political Economy and Finance. At this critical time, some members of the Class of 1905 came forward to reassure the new Dean that they had complete faith in his policies and that they would, in every way possible, endeavor to promote the success of the school, to work to make the new degree respected and valued.

These same eager, serious-minded students later were to become the founders and the first elected members of Alpha Kappa Psi Fraternity. From the start the group had firm support from the Dean; in addition, Cleveland F. Bacon, Professor of Law at the School of Commerce, acted as their attorney and legal advisor. The students occupied the same seats in class five nights a week in the eighth floor classrooms of the new University Building on Washington Square. Since they all worked by day and had school work too, they had little time for any school social activities, but the early members managed to get together on Friday nights and have a social time, spent mostly in talk of the school. It was only natural that, without any apparent design or effort the Four should meet each night after classes to take advantage of the quietness of lower Broadway to walk south for twenty-five minute to City Hall and thence across the Brooklyn Bridge to their homes. They talked over their mutual problems. They soon acquired a new name and were widely heralded as the Brooklyn Four.

But too little has been said and not enough generally known about two other outstanding men of the Class of 1905 who likewise exercised and talked over their various problems while walking from class but in the opposite direction, north, toward midtown Manhattan. They were Robert Stuart Douglas and Daniel Vincent Duff.

Perhaps it was in their first year, but surely not later than their second, that Frederic R. Leach suggested the organization of a fraternity. The idea met with unanimous approval. Leach and the other members of the Brooklyn Four mulled over the idea of fraternity for some time. In the winter, during the 1903-04 school year, much further spadework was accomplished. At the beginning, several meetings of those students who were the founders of Alpha Kappa Psi were conducted in a somewhat informal manner in conjunction with banquets held at various hotels in Manhattan. By late April plans had assumed definite shape; at the close of the academic year a date was set for a meeting in the Hotel St. Denis.

On June 9,1904, Douglas, Camp, Duff, Wright, Rachmil, Lane, Leach, Bergen, and Jefferson met at this hotel. All the men were strongly in favor of forming a fraternity, and many points thought worthy of being incorporated into a constitution were suggested. The men realized that the B.C.S. degree then was of relatively little or no commercial value in the community. They firmly believed, however, that it could be made to be of as much significance as the C.P.A. and that this change could be accomplished through the united efforts of men of strong character from the school. They were convinced that higher education for businessmen was a vital need in America, and they were willing to dedicate themselves to assist in encouraging such college training.

The group appointed the Brooklyn Four to draft an acceptable constitution to be presented the next time they gathered. After agreeing to meet on an excursion trip during the summer, they parted. The committee conferred several more times, embodying their ideas into a tentative constitution which they were then ready to report on at a meeting held on July 16, 1904, at Sea Cliff, Long Island. The trip there was made by steamer, but owing to several absences from the city because of vacations and other unforeseen events, only five of the men were present: Douglas, Lane, Rachmil, Leach, and Bergen. The constitution as submitted was read, and new plans were also suggested and considered.

Nothing more was accomplished until after school reopened in the fall. The plan of organization, though, was still quite alive, and on October 5, 1904, the charter members met in the Assembly Room, 32 Waverly Place; all ten were there. They decided to set up a professional fraternity at once, along the lines of the constitution which had been presented by the Brooklyn Four Committee, and to choose a president, secretary, and treasurer in accordance therewith, these officers to assume similar positions under the constitution when it was finally adopted. On written ballots, R. S. Douglas was elected President; H. M. Jefferson, Secretary; Nathan Lane, Jr., Treasurer; W.O. Tremaine, Vice-President; and Morris S. Rachmil, Financial Secretary, a choice made unanimous by acclamation. A committee of three, Rachmil, Tremaine, and Camp, was appointed to study the constitution draft, criticize and revise it, and report recommendations as soon as possible. This marked the founding date of the Fraternity, October 5,1904.

[edit] Women in AKΨ

In June of 1972, Title IX of the "Education Amendments Act of 1972" prohibited sex discrimination in federally assisted educational programs and amended parts of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Professional fraternities were included in Title IX. Around this time, the brothers of the Delta Chi Chapter at Clarkson University introduced legislation to amend Alpha Kappa Psi's Constitution to include women as brothers. Though supported by several other chapters, the proposed amendments were easily defeated. In the fall of 1973, the Delta Chi chapter admitted four women into their Chapter and soon granted females full rights and privileges. Delta Chi went on to elect a female president and attempted to send her to the national convention as their voting delegate. As a result, Alpha Kappa Psi revoked the charter of the Delta Chi Chapter.

In December of 1973, a complaint was filed with the Department of Health, Education and Welfare against thirteen colleges and universities which recognized chapters of a professional business fraternity. In 1973, the Fraternity Alliance for Inalienable Rights, a seventeen member organization which included Alpha Kappa Psi, was formed to oppose Title IX as it applied to professional fraternities. In October 1975, Alpha Kappa Psi initiated a fund drive to combat Title IX. A write-in campaign was also started as an attempt to sway legislators. At the national convention, the Committee on Female Membership moved that the fraternity should bar women, advocating a continuance of the struggle to secure legislation. Such a law was later introduced in Congress in May, but it was defeated. The convention voted the Board of Directors the authority to change Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution by deletion of the words "must be men and." When it became apparent that legislation would not be approved, the Board of Directors voted, August 7, 1976, to admit women into the fraternity.

[edit] Statistics & Trivia

Number of active student chapters: 197 in the United States, 2 in Canada, and 1 in the United Kingdom
AKPsi is the only Business Fraternity to have active International Chapters
Number of Chapters chartered since founding in 1904: 312
New charters granted in 2005-2006 (to date): 8 (University of Maine, Eastern Kentucky University, Florida A&M University, Vanderbilt University, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Georgetown University, Delaware State University, Towson University)
Initiates in 2004-2005: 5,598
Initiates since 1904: more than 230,000
Number of current student members: 8,500
2005 Convention attendance (Las Vegas): 805
2005 Success Institute attendance: 2,273
Alpha Kappa Psi first admitted women into the fraternity in 1976.
Alpha Kappa Psi membership is now open to all college majors, as of 2005.
The largest house chapter resides at the Alpha Epsilon chapter at the University of Georgia in Athens.

[edit] Objectives

To further the individual welfare of members;
To foster scientific research in the fields of commerce, accounts, and finance;
To educate the public to appreciate and demand higher ideals therein; and
To promote and advance in institutions of college rank, courses leading to degrees in business administration.

[edit] Notable Alumni

Main article: List of Notable Alpha Kappa Psi Alumni

[edit] Chapters

Main article: List of Alpha Kappa Psi Chapters

There are over 300 chapters of Alpha Kappa Psi around the world, 197 of which are active. A select number of chapters have actual houses on college campuses. These chapters include: