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Alpha Phi Omega (APO, or A-Phi-O) is a co-ed service fraternity organized to provide community service, leadership and social opportunities to college students. The fraternity exists in the United States and the Philippines. Unlike other fraternities, APO's primary purpose is to provide volunteer service within four areas: service to the community, service to the campus, service to the youth, and service to the nation as participating citizens. Being primarily a service organization, the fraternity restricts its chapters from maintaining fraternity houses to serve as residences for their members.Alpha Phi Omega claims to be the largest fraternity. In the U.S., the fraternity has chapters at 350 colleges, a current active membership of approximately 17,000 and has over 300,000 alumni. Chapters range in size from just a handful of active members at some small colleges to over a hundred active members at larger institutions.
It was founded on December 16, 1925 at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania by Frank Reed Horton and a group of former Boy Scouts as a way to continue participating in the ideals of Scouting at the college level. The founders insisted that all those gaining membership must pledge to uphold the fraternity's three cardinal principles of Leadership, Friendship, and Service. The fraternity was opened to women in 1976. All members are called "Brothers".
Typical fraternity projects include blood drives, tutoring, charity fundraising events, Scouting events, and housing construction/rehabilitation. Much of the operations of individual chapters is left to their own discretion, though most chapters have membership requirements which require a certain number of hours of service each semester. Some chapters of APO claim to complete over 5,000 hours of community service in an academic year.
Before women were allowed to join APO a sorority, parallel in ideals but independent in structure, was formed for women who had been Camp Fire Girls or Girl Scouts: Omega Phi Alpha .
Famous alumni include
- Bill Clinton, U.S. President
- James Lovell, Apollo 13This article is about the Moon mission. There is also a ''movie by the name of Apollo 13''. Apollo 13 was an American space mission, part of the Apollo program. It was intended to be the third mission to land on the Moon, but instead is famous for the cri astronaut
- Tom DaschleThomas Andrew Daschle (born December 9, 1947), known as Tom Daschle is the current Senate Minority Leader in the United States Senate until his term ends in 2005. A Democrat, he was defeated on November 2, 2004 by the Republican candidate, John Thune, in, U.S. Senator
- H. Roe Bartle , mayor of Kansas City and namesake of the Kansas City ChiefsThe Kansas City Chiefs are a National Football League team based in Kansas City, Missouri. Franchise Founded 1959 First Season 1960 (charter American Football League member; joined NFL in 1970 league merger) Formerly known as Dallas Texans, 1960-62, then
- Togo D. West, Jr.Togo Dennis West, Jr. born June 21, 1942) was the third person to occupy the post of United States Secretary of Veterans Affairs. He was nominated by President Bill Clinton on January 27, 1998, during Clinton's second term, and was confirmed by the Senate, Secretary of Veteran's Affairs under Clinton
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