It was 1994 when I received the news that Delta Sigma Theta was finally going to grace the campus of Northern Kentucky University. I had talked to some of the professors who were Deltas and expressed my interest in pledging long before then.

I had been exposed to DST in 1988 while on the campus of Ohio State University. There, I saw nothing but red flyers hanging from everywhere, announcing upcoming community service events and occasional parties.

I saw how they looked at one another and I noticed how others looked at them. There was a sense of respect on both sides; Deltas respecting each other, and us respecting them. I knew that I had to find out more information about this sorority and why people thought so highly of them. It was reading the book, In Search of Sisterhood, that put my respect for them on a different level. I finally understood why they had so much love for each other. That is when the dream of being a Delta started.

However, once receiving the word that Delta was finally coming to a campus that had a student population that was less than 1% black, I was heart-broken and happy all in the same breath. What I had dreamed about so often was finally here. But at the time, I was financially struggling to the point where I didn’t have a clue sometimes where the next meal would come from.

My mom had just been through triple-by-pass surgery and I was her caretaker. I had to worry about buying new medicines and keeping up on new diets. I couldn’t possibly take any money from my home and place it in the hands of Delta at that time. Never the less, Dr. Pamela Hill and Dr. Harriet Richard encouraged me to keep my head up and believe that if it was truly meant for me to be a Delta, then I would be a Delta.

I crossed in the spring of 1995 with nine beautiful women, with the help of some of the most devastating, passionate, considerate members of the Cincinnati Alumnae Chapter who graciously paid my membership fees. Even after countless efforts of trying to repay them, all they asked of me was for my repayment to be a good and dedicated Delta. What a dream come true!

Thank you God for the women of DST.

Ruth M. Ross Keaton
Long Beach, CA