MANHATTAN — More than 100 Kansas State University students are among the first class of scholars recently inducted into the university’s chapter of Alpha Alpha Alpha, or Tri-Alpha, the national first-generation college student honorary society.

Area K-State first-generation students new members of Tri-Alpha are Jasmine Bates, junior in music education, Alden, and 

Brittney Schrag, junior in elementary education, Hudson.

Tri-Alpha recognizes undergraduate first-generation students who have earned at least a 3.2 grade point average on 30 semester hours of academic work. These students must meet the definition of first-generation student, which is neither of the student’s parents, step-parents or legal guardians completed a bachelor’s or associate degree.

The chapter is a registered departmental student organization and is sponsored by K-State’s Office of First-generation Students.

The honorary society also inducts faculty and staff who were first-generation students and are willing to serve as mentors to current first-generation students; alumni who were first-generation students; and honorary inductees — who do not have to be first-generation students — who are donors or serve in a leadership capacity to advance first-generation student success. 

The K-State chapter inducted two honorary members who have been champions of first-generation student success at K-State: Richard Myers, university president, and Ken Griffin, former business dean and professor emeritus at the University of Wyoming. Faculty inductees are Christy Craft, professor and chair of the special education, counseling and student affairs department in the College of Education, and William Richter, professor emeritus of political science and associate provost of international programs. The alumnus inductee is Jahvelle Rhone, a 2010 K-State graduate and information technology coordinator with the K-State Division of Information Technology.