Dr. Rose Butler Browne (1897–1986) was a groundbreaking educator, author, civil rights leader, and a distinguished member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. Born in Boston and raised in Newport, Rhode Island, she became the first Black woman to earn a doctorate in education from Harvard University in 1939.

She was also the first Black woman to graduate from Rhode Island State College. Her academic and professional career included faculty roles at Virginia State College, West Virginia State College, and Bluefield State College. In 1948, she became chair of the education department at North Carolina College for Negroes (now North Carolina Central University), where she modernized curricula, expanded facilities, and championed literacy through programs like the Pleasurable Reading Program.

Dr. Browne made national headlines when she refused to send her students to teach in West Virginia public schools, in protest of unequal pay for Black teachers. Her stand pressured the state to change its discriminatory policy.

A devoted member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, she served in several leadership roles, including:

• Life Member
  
  

• Golden Soror (honoring over 50 years of service)
  
  

• Past Supreme Parliamentarian
  
  

• Past Regional Director of the Mid-Atlantic Region
  
  

• Member of the National Reading Experience Resources Committee
  
  

Beyond academia, she was deeply rooted in community work—operating a daycare at Mount Vernon Baptist Church, helping charter a credit union, and running a nursery school centered on love and racial pride.

An active civic leader, Dr. Browne also contributed to the YWCA, Women in Action for the Prevention of Violence, the Girl Scouts, and numerous professional organizations. She received multiple awards and honors, including honorary doctorates and buildings named in her honor. Her 1969 autobiography, Love My Children, attributed her strength and purpose to her great-grandmother, a Native American woman who married a formerly enslaved man.

Dr. Rose Butler Browne died on December 1, 1986, in Providence, Rhode Island. She remains a towering figure in the fight for educational equality and Black excellence.