When Debby Rooney went to Kenya on vacation in 1991, she had no idea she would come back and start a scholarship program for African girls.

Within a year, Rooney had started BEADS (Beads for Education, Advancement, Development and Success), an organization that seeks sponsors to donate money for young African girls to attend elementary schools, secondary schools and college.

Currently, there are 127 girls being sponsored in the program.

The organization's name comes from the beaded crafts the Maasai women make to contribute to their daughters' education. These include coasters, key chains and dog collars.

"We don't believe in a free education, and it allows the women to provide for their families," she said.

BEADS' mission is to improve the status of women in Africa through business development classes and education, Rooney said.

Rooney said no one could reach the Maasai community like its own people.

"Our vision is that the high school and college graduates will repay their scholarship by teaching in local schools," Rooney said.

Rooney is a Penn State and Pi Beta Phi sorority alumna. She contacted the sorority to help sponsor a Maasai girl.

"We are so excited Debby chose us to be the first chapter to sponsor a girl, and we hope to sponsor more than one girl in the future," said Colleen Briley, Pi Beta Phi president.

Pi Beta Phi is sponsoring Abigail, a girl who has completed the program and serves as an intern in Kenya, Briley said.

Along with monetary donations, the sponsored girls need school supplies, running shoes and reading glasses.

"We want to send six or seven cameras over for the photography class too," Briley said.

African and African American Studies and Women's Studies professor Cassandra Veney said the BEADS program is positive for African girls.

"It is very commendable and worthwhile for these girls to get education," she said.

However, Veney said she was turned off to the site after viewing the word "tribe" on the group's Web site, www.beadsforeducation.org.

"It is a racist term, one that we don't use anymore. If we identify people as tribes, it should be used across the board," she said.

African and African American studies, and political science professor Kidane Mengisteab agreed with Veney that it is important to make people aware of the situation in Africa, but also took offense to the term "tribe."

"The word tribe has a negative connotation," he said.

Rooney said that because there are 42 different tribes in Kenya, it is often easier to use the word "tribe" when referring to them.

"I myself usually use the word 'people'," she said.