Students at historically Black colleges and universities have flaunted distinctive looks on campus for decades. Dressing in creative outfits helps HBCU students express themselves, and campuses embrace specific trends all their own, such as the resurgence of Y2K fashion, replacing backpacks with Marc Jacobs totes, and theme days like Monochromatic Mondays. Taylor Davis, a Philadelphia […]
Education
‘Money like that would not come to someone like me’
Rayquan Smith, a running back at Virginia State University who has landed 88 brand deals, fancies himself as the “King of NIL.” That’s “name, image, likeness” — a set of rules allowing athletes to sign endorsement deals and earn money while in college. The National College Athletic Association enacted the policy in 2021, a major step […]
Shaw University Hopes Redevelopment Can Ease Years of Financial Struggle
Shaw University — which has called Raleigh, North Carolina, home since its founding in 1865 — is hoping a campus redevelopment and rezoning project will help ease its financial problems. Like many other historically Black colleges, the university has struggled financially due to declining enrollment, underfunding, and a shrinking market share. Private and federal loans, combined […]
HBCU Underfunding Stretches More Than a Century, Morgan State Professor argues
America’s historically Black colleges and universities have been vastly underfunded compared to institutions that serve predominantly white students. The government has estimated the disparity between HBCUs and predominantly white institutions to be about $12.6 billion. There are numerous factors at play, but racism is at the center, says Steven Mobley, an associate professor at Morgan […]
Here’s Your Overdue History Lesson on Edward Waters University
A white gunman on Saturday killed three Black people at a Dollar General in Jacksonville, Florida — after he’d been chased from the campus of nearby Edward Waters University. But the historically Black school is much more than a stop on the way to the site of a murderous rampage: Edward Waters looms large in […]
Student Loan Payments Are Looming. The Debt Burdens Black Women Years After Graduation.
When it comes to student debt, no group of borrowers shoulders more of the burden than Black women. Black women graduate with an average of $38,800 in debt, more than any other group. And over time, the problem only worsens. A dozen years after they start college, Black women owe an average of 13% more […]
How Do We Teach Black History in Polarized Times? Here’s What It Looks Like in Three Cities.
This story about Black history in schools was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter. One day this spring, Victoria Trice’s high school students in downtown Louisville, Kentucky, peered through virtual reality headsets as part of a lesson on […]
How to Combat the Whitewashing of Black Studies
The backlash to Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ assault on Black history and the release of the Florida Board of Education’s new teaching standards has been swift — but with the new school year starting this month, enraged parents and educators may not have much of a choice in the classroom. The requirement that middle school […]
Black and Latino Students Are Struggling with Mental Health. This Program Could Help.
When Sandra Kalu was in high school, the majority of her teachers were white, while her classmates were mostly Black and Latino. The disparity mattered. One incident, she says, still sticks in her mind. A teacher admitted to her class that he would cross the street any time he saw a Black or Latino man […]
Tips From a College Admissions Dean on Applying in a Post-Affirmative Action World
The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision on Thursday to gut affirmative action in college admissions has left many Black applicants and their families wondering how to navigate new higher-education terrain. In his opinion for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts said that Harvard University and the University of North Carolina’s race-conscious admissions policies “cannot be […]