An open letter - Black colleges

Black Issues in Higher Education, May 1, 1997 by Alvin O. Chambliss, Jr.

This is excerpted from an open letter sent by Alvin Chambliss Jr., Esquire, of Texas Southern University, to Dr. Elias Blake Jr., executive director, Benjamin E. Mays Institute, concerning historically Black colleges and universities.

Chambliss is the lead attorney in Ayers v. Fordice, a twenty-year old case which argues that the state of Mississippi has an affirmative obligation to eradicate all traces of segregation in its public higher education system. Blake is a consultant to the plaintiffs in the same case.,

NAFEO is the membership organization of all historically and predominantly Black colleges and universities.

Dear Dr. Blake:

After talking to you for a long period of time about the critical situation public Black colleges find themselves in, I am compelled to write you an open letter that can and should be shared with the world.

I will not mince words because to do so, I would be betraying the trust of our young college students who I represent. Moreover, the situation is critical and we have very few people who are willing to put anything on the line. You and I have caught hell from our families who allowed us to work in the struggle for free while Ph.D. personnel walked around worrying not about their next meal, but rather, rank and tenure, salaries and foreign travel. Good people like Dr. Arthur E. Thomas, formerly of Central State, are chewed up and kicked to the curb while NAFEO (the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education) and its leadership looks on. I am not sure whether anything positive can be done ... but we must study this situation so that it cannot be replicated elsewhere. Colleges and universities must operate in the interest of students -- or, stated another way, without students they would cease to exist.

During April, 1992, the Mississippi congressional delegation asked, what do you people want?

As you know, the issue of public vs. private Black colleges caused many members on Capitol Hill to question whether we really knew what we wanted.

Deja vu.

It is now April 11, 1997, five years later and the issue has not been resolved. This is criminal and Black students need to know that their leaders are not taking care of business. This is apparent when one looks at public Black colleges' long term goals and/or strategies.

Financial aid and accreditation are areas where the leadership at HBCUs are denied basic respect.

Actions taken by the Criteria and Reports Committee of the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools during its annual meeting held in Atlanta, Georgia, December 10-13, 1995 are instructive:

Warning

1. Alabama A&M University, Huntsville, Alabama 2. Grambling State University, Ruston, Louisiana 3. Denmark Technical College, Denmark, South Carolina 4. Livingston College, Salisbury, North Carolina 5. St. Paul's College, Lawrenceville, Virginia

Probation

1. Knoxville College, Knoxville, Tennessee 2. Barber-Scotia College, Concord, North Carolina

Dropped Institution from Membership

1. Texas College, Tyler, Texas 2. Selma University, Selma, Alabama

Colleges removed from probation and had their accreditation reaffirmed.

1. Edward Waters College, Jacksonville, Florida 2. Allen University, Columbia, South Carolina

We know what the problems are, but we fail to respond appropriately or take long range action to combat anticipated actions. This is telling in the area of financial aid where all of the rules of the game favor large white institutions.

We cannot continue to seek waivers and/or exemptions when, if we change the rules, we would achieve exemplary status. We must become more proactive.

A student enters Harvard University with a 4.0 GPA and a 36 on the ACT. Another from the Mississippi Delta enters Mississippi Valley State University with a 2.8 GPA and a 15 on the ACT. Through hard work and going to school year round, the Mississippi Valley student finishes college in five years and passes the NTE on his or her first try as does the Harvard student who took off several semesters to travel in Europe. They both receive a Ph.D. during the decade.

Dr. Blake, I don't care what the experts say, in terms of achievement progression, the Mississippi Valley State student is better than the Harvard student and the faculty at Mississippi Valley did a better job of teaching than the Harvard faculty. This kind of experience cries out for promotion at public and private Black colleges. Until and unless we believe in our students and faculty we have lost the game before it officially starts.

The issue of higher education desegregation for public Black colleges is, as Justice Scalia stated: "What I do predict is a number of years of litigation-driven confusion and destabilization in the university systems of all the formerly de jure [segregated] states that will benefit neither. nor whites, neither predominantly Black institutions nor predominantly white ones." Ayers v. Fordice 60 U.S.L.W. 4781 (1992).

Formerly de jure states are: Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, North Carolina, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Carolina, West Virginia, Florida, Kentucky, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Virginia. Ohio did not submit a Plan of Compliance and Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Tennessee are involved in litigation. According to the OCR regulation "an examination must be made of a "wide range of factors to determine whether [a] State has perpetuated its formerly de jure segregation in any facet of its institutional system."