The Omicron Rho Lambda Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha Inc. will hold its 30th annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast Jan. 21 at 8:30 a.m. at the Vicksburg Convention Center on Mulberry Street.

The program is hosted by the Omicron Rho Lambda Educational Foundation. The featured speaker will be Dr. Everett B. Ward, general president of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Inc. and president of Saint Augustine’s University in Raleigh, North Carolina.

“Through our foundation we give away scholarships and support a mentoring program for youth between the ages of 12 and 18,” program coordinator Edward L. Huell Jr. said. “We do this annually on the Martin Luther King holiday.”

Huell said the annual program is based on an idea from former Vicksburg Mayor Robert Major Walker, who was a member of the local Alpha Phi Alpha chapter.

When Walker was mayor, he said, he attended a conference and attended a scholarship breakfast.

“He came back to Vicksburg and introduced it to the local chapter here,” Huell said. “They initiated to breakfast on the MLK holiday, and ever since then, we’ve been doing the breakfast, and it has grown from 50 people to over 400 average attendance of that event.”

Money from the breakfast helps fund scholarships for graduating high school seniors, book scholarships to graduating seniors from the fraternity’s mentoring program.

The fraternity also gives out $100 scholarships to seventh-grade students attending Vicksburg and Warren Central Junior high schools, who write an essay, “What Does Dr. Martin Luther King Mean to Me.”

Tickets for the breakfast are $25 in advance and $30 at the door. For more information, call Huell at 601-630-0142, or Ben Brown at 601-218-2068.