As far as Janice L. Nicholson was concerned, there was only one university she wanted to attend. “Anything other than Howard University was a waste of time,” she reflects. Her sole choice turned out to be a good one. She was accepted at Howard, graduated, and now is its Associate Vice President for Enrollment Management.
LaVanski D. Meeks, on the other hand, didn’t care where he went to college as long as it was a small campus, had a curriculum that emphasized medicine, and, coming from Michigan, was someplace warm. He applied to eight institutions and was accepted at all of them, but Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans matched his criteria. Initially, the fact that it was a historically black university (HBCU) was not really a factor, Meeks says. But coming from a predominantly white high school and at the urging of friends, the black experience that Xavier offered made it the top contender.
Yet after one year, Meeks transferred to predominantly white Xavier University in Cincinnati. Again, his decision was not made on the basis of either university being a black or white institution. Instead, Meeks changed his major. During his freshman year, he realized that medicine was not for him. Business had always been in the back of his mind, so he took another look at institutions he’d initially considered. He knew Xavier University in Cincinnati had a strong minority support system and a business department with a solid reputation. Also the University offered him a good financial package. Cold weather notwithstanding, Meeks moved to Cincinnati and will soon graduate from Xavier’s business department.
The decision is a personal one
As these examples illustrate, the choice to attend an HBCU or a traditionally white institution (TWI) is a decidedly personal decision for African-American college applicants. “Every student wrestles with this issue–some more than others,” comments Frank Matthews, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Black Issues in Higher Education. When his daughter was deciding among institutions “everyone had opinions,” he says, noting that the quandary she faced was a positive dilemma. “Any time you have options and choices, that’s good,” he observes.
Choosing which college to attend is usually difficult for anyone to make once location, public or private status, campus size, environment, curriculum, and tuition are factored into the final analysis. But when an African-American student is looking at HBCUs, a whole other set of family and cultural issues are raised, says Lori Wright, Coordinator of Multicultural Student Recruitment at Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Factor in family opinions
Parental and family expectations often are key elements that African-American students must take into consideration. For instance, Nicholson contends that most of today’s college applicants come from a population of parents who could go to any institution after the late 1960s and thus chose to attend traditionally white institutions. Today, those parents encourage their children to attend HBCUs because they realize what they missed. Or, she says, parents who chose HBCUs want their children to share in what they had.
Conversely, Michael Tapscott, Director of the Office of Minority Student Affairs at George Mason University in Washington, D.C., adds that some parents who attended majority institutions were influenced by the prevailing assumption at that time that achieving the American dream was more accessible in majority institutions. Now when their children are choosing colleges, some discourage them from HBCUs for that reason.
Students and their parents see college from different perspectives
Whatever the background of parents, L’Tanya Richmond, Associate Director of Admissions and Director of Minority Affairs at Elon College in the town of Elon College, North Carolina, observes that many African-American high school students see the choice of a college in a far different context.
Wright agrees, noting that the African-American applicants she talks to are looking at both HBCUs and TWIs and points to her own experience. Even though all of her family had gone to historically black colleges, Wright says she wanted a smaller institution that was traditionally white, “My mother went to an HBCU, and I wanted to be different,” she confides. She had come from a high school that was 40 percent black and 60 percent white and knew she could excel in a white environment.
Whatever the reasons for choosing or not choosing HBCUs, Antoine M. Garibaldi, Provost and Chief Academic Officer at Howard University, notes a 30 percent increase in HBCU enrollment over the last ten years, with 28 percent of all African-American students who get bachelor’s degrees graduating from HBCUs. These numbers reflect a notable departure from the prediction made by educators some years ago that the need for HBCUs would decline when majority institutions first opened their admissions to African Americans. That opinion has changed due in part to the impact of affirmative action and diversity awareness, Garibaldi asserts.
POINTS OF DISCUSSION AND MISCONCEPTIONS
One of the reasons why the choice of HBCU or TWI is complicated is because there are many valid reasons that favor one or the other. Some are obvious differences. Others are subtle, embodying a whole subcategory of cultural concerns.
But it’s not the real world.
For many students, the desire to attend a majority institution stems from the perception that HBCUs might not adequately prepare them for the real world that awaits after graduation. There are two sides to this opinion, states Matthews. If a student sees college as a starting ground for life, then the nurturing environment of an HBCU is the obvious choice. But if college is seen as a toughening-up process, then a TWI makes more sense for a student. “Some see higher education as a time to be free. Others see it as an opportunity to be challenged and faced with some real things,” counsels Matthews. Nabulungi Mack-Williams, who will soon graduate from Spelman College and wants to continue on in premed studies, characterizes HBCUs as sanctuaries for African-American students. “It’s empowering,” she says, of her four years at Spelman, adding that her time there has prepared her to face the world.
Nicholson often addresses this subject when talking to prospective Howard students. Her counter to the “real world is white” concern is that African-American students at majority institutions aren’t going to get much utilitarian advice from white faculty members about what it will take to make it in the corporate world. At black institutions, they will.
At majority institutions, black students often don’t mix with white students very much anyway, points out Matthews. According to him, the fact that there really isn’t a substantive cross-cultural environment on many TWI campuses is something administrators haven’t come to grips with. “African-American students at majority institutions often segregate themselves to find a safe harbor,” he elaborates.
The black presence on white campuses.
Parents and their children have to be honest with themselves and take a long, hard, pragmatic look at the needs of the student and how the campus environment can fulfill them. Many top-tier institutions aren’t into nurturing, Matthews remarks. They figure since you’re there, you’ll have to make it through on your own. Yet, he also reports that some majority campuses do make a genuine effort to include African-American students and ensure they have a good college experience.
As an example, Michael Tapscott, Director of the Office of Minority Student Affairs at George Mason University, recalls a conference he recently attended at a majority university. Within minutes of setting foot on campus he perceived a black presence there. “It was difficult to describe. I could see it in the art, the speakers, and musicians on posters and flyers, yet I hadn’t seen a soul,” he recollects. Tapscott remembers when he was choosing a college, he, too, considered HBCUs, but made the decision to go to Tufts after he visited the campus and saw there was a strong commitment to African-American students like himself.
However, not all majority institutions offer that level of support for nonwhite students. Unfortunately, many of today’s applicants don’t fully research that aspect of campus life. Matthews, who was one of the first black students to attend Clemson University in South Carolina, says that African Americans in the 1960s and 1970s were acutely aware that they were walking into a hostile environment on majority campuses. He contends that many of today’s high school students have been, for the most part, protected from racism and don’t realize what they might encounter. “We, the black boomers, sheltered our kids from racist behavior, and they’re having trouble coping these days,” Matthews states.
To address this concern, Richmond, who has built a successful minority program at Elon College, bluntly informs African-American freshmen during orientation about the subtle and not-so-subtle challenges they could face on the mostly white campus.
HBCUs and the students attending them are all the same.
In addition to the realities of cultural differences on majority campuses, parents and students might be waylaid by persistent myths about HBCUs–even a lack of awareness that HBCUs exist, says Thandabantu B. Maceo, Director of Admissions and Interim Financial Aid Director at Central State University in Wilberforce, Ohio. As most HBCUs are located in the south, students in the west are the least aware of them. However, that’s quickly changing with the advent of the Internet and college Web sites.
Without adequate information, parents and students often think HBCUs are all the same and have all black faculty and staff members. Nicholson knows differently. Her freshman advisor at Howard was white. In fact, 16 percent of Howard’s current faculty members are white.
There’s also no typical HBCU student. Says Maceo, “We get students who come from all rungs of the socioeconomic ladder.” Garibaldi concurs that Howard students are from every state in the nation and more than 120 countries. Juliet Johnson, Interim Director of Admissions and Orientation Services at Spelman College, notes that a lot of students ask about the diversity at Spelman. She’s quick to tell them that Spelman’s student profile reflects students of single-parent homes to young women from the top private schools. Wright says the same thing about the diversity at HBCUs in general. There’s a broad cross-representation of people in HBCUs from every state and many foreign countries as well as from students coming out of poverty situations to the children of wealthy and famous parents.
The debate about skills to succeed.
Even though some parents feel strongly about how their African-American heritage is reflected at HBCUs, they discourage their children from attending because they fear graduates don’t have satisfactory skills to succeed in a competitive workplace. “That’s a problem that’s systemic and difficult to battle,” Tapscott counters. “But the quality of education at HBCUs is at least as competitive.” Wright agrees that HBCUs went through a lot of bad press, but with increased endowments and resources being made available to them, they are now showing a greater stability.
No one right answer
With all the input that’s needed to choose a college, African-American parents and children could be overwhelmed with the issues on either side of the decision between an HBCU or TWI. Unfortunately, you can’t assume an HBCU is best for every student of color, says Richmond. But she is impressed that this generation of students, whom she talks to and meets with every day, are thoughtful about the decision before them and look beyond racial affairs. “Ten years ago, students were concerned about black and white issues,” she says. “Today they’re interested in study abroad and the strength of a particular curriculum. They’re very different.”
The same can be said of their choices in higher education.
For more information about selecting a historically black college university or traditionally white institution, read the following articles