March 14, 2005
A QUIET BUT noteworthy trend is occurring at historically black colleges and universities around the country: More white students are enrolling. This is a welcome, if ironic, development at institutions founded when racism denied higher education to blacks.
White enrollment at these institutions, known as HBCUs, grew 65 percent during the last 25 years, from 21,000 to 35,000. Nationwide, white enrollment at publicly funded HBCUs is at 13 percent. The increase in enrollment by whites and, to a lesser extent, by Hispanic and Asian-American students is the result of outreach by the schools, more affordable tuitions and shifting attitudes and perceptions by whites who once viewed the schools as unwelcoming and of lesser quality. Demographic shifts are also driving the increase, as is simple economics -- the schools need new students to shore up declining enrollments by blacks lured away by white colleges wanting to diversify their student bodies.
This is an encouraging trend. And though race is still a divisive issue on many college campuses, there has been little controversy over the presence of more white and other non-black students at institutions whose missions are to educate and nurture black students in supportive environments and prepare them for the challenges and hostility they may face as minorities in the larger white world when they graduate. That, too, is a positive sign.
Still, concerns have been raised about scholarships and spots given to white students that could be going to blacks, and about the possible dilution of an Afrocentric culture and educational approach on campuses. And some of the increases in white enrollment occurred at public colleges and universities that were pressured by lawmakers to increase white enrollment or face funding cuts, causing some resentment at a time when black enrollment is dropping at colleges that ended affirmative action. But black college administrators attending an HBCU conference last week vowed not to stray from their core mission even as they embrace more white students.
Maryland is home to four HBCUs, including Baltimore's Morgan State, where degree programs in architecture and city planning have lured white students. At the 110-year-old Bluefield State College in West Virginia, founded as a black teachers college, only 12 percent of students are black. West Virginia State University and Lincoln University in Missouri are now majority-white.
In Texas, where the Mexican-American population has skyrocketed, historically black colleges such as Prairie View A&M are targeting Hispanic students for recruitment.
White students on black campuses will, no doubt, learn more about black culture. And perhaps black and white students will see each other as "us" instead of "them" by the time they graduate and go out into the world.
That would be the most encouraging sign of all.
