(NAME-MCE) New Conversation on Black Colleges

[Anselmo Villanueva]

New Conversation' on Black Colleges

July 21, 2009

Obama administration's pick to lead White House initiative says it is time
to emphasize excellence, and move beyond the "against great odds narrative."

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/07/21/wilson

New Approach on Black Colleges  July 21, 2009

WASHINGTON -- Asked at the end of his first day in office to compare his
agenda to those of his predecessors, John Silvanus Wilson Jr. declines to do
so. But the Obama administration's director of the White House Initiative on
Historically Black Colleges and Universities is very clear in an interview
that he's looking for a new approach to talking about black colleges.

The standard "against great odds" narrative, he said, needs to be replaced.
It suggests a focus on "survival and maybe victimization," said Wilson.
"Black colleges will never be as strong as they can be unless that narrative
changes.... We need to shift from how to survive to how to thrive."

Wilson, formerly an administrator at George Washington University and the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, turned to film soundtracks as a
metaphor. When black colleges "go out and seek support, the soundtrack that
philanthropists and prospects hear is dominated by violins, and we need to
go out and seek support where the soundtrack is trumpets. I helped raise a
lot of money at MIT, and we never played the violin. The trumpet is about
greatness and the violin is about pity. We don't need support that comes
from pity, but investment that comes from a belief in what we can do."

And while Wilson wouldn't talk about the previous focus of the White House
black college office, asked about its work trying to help black colleges win
more federal grants, he said, "the challenge has got to expand beyond
working with 32 federal agencies."

While Wilson's career has been at predominantly white institutions, he has
been deeply involved with black colleges, too. He has worked on several
foundation efforts to help build the fund raising capacity of black
colleges. He is a trustee of Spelman College. His mother went to Morgan
State University and his father to Virginia Union. Wilson is a Morehouse
College graduate (with a Harvard University doctorate) who takes seriously
the ethos of the Morehouse Man.

"Going to Morehouse was very special for me, because the culture on the
campus was one of high achievement. They expected us to do well there at
Morehouse and beyond, to go out and make a mark," said Wilson.

Unlike many alumni (of all kinds of colleges), Wilson doesn't appear to view
his alma mater through rose-colored glasses. When this reporter made a
reference to Morehouse doing quite well, Wilson said, "I'm going to push
back there." He explained: "I think Morehouse is doing quite well relative
to other black colleges, but not quite well to the best of the industry, and
I will insist on looking at Morehouse and other black colleges relative to
the best in the industry," he said. "We should not trying to be the best
black institutions, but the best institutions."

Many black colleges are facing a series of common problems, Wilson said:
"low faculty salaries, insufficient financial aid, often poor facilities."
And "the common denominator is capital impairment." He said that even the
wealthiest black colleges have a fraction of the funds found at leading
American colleges and universities.

The only way more funds will be found, he said, is "to look at the value
proposition of black colleges," which at most institutions "has been
minimally addressed for a long time."

A focus on the value proposition may be especially important, he said, for
those colleges that are struggling right now. Paul Quinn
College<http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/06/26/paulquinn>is
facing the threat of losing its accreditation. Clark
Atlanta University <http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/02/09/cau> this
year dismissed 70 faculty members, including tenured professors. Shaw
University <http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/05/14/qt#198843>'s
president quit in May, amid mounting debt and student and faculty criticism.

Asked about these colleges, Wilson said: "I'm concerned about their
survival, just as I am concerned about the survival of any institution that
is doing good things. This is about America, and therefore any institution,
black or white, that is helping Americans to get an education and contribute
more to society and get us out of this hole needs to not only to survive,
but needs to thrive."

He added: "The issue, even for those institutions that are struggling not to
go under, is the value proposition. What is it, even at this fiscal point,
that they can say to the wealthiest individuals in America, what can they
say that they have been doing to cause those wealthy individuals to pull out
their checkbooks, and pull them back from death row, and position them to
thrive? If they can't answer that question, then it's going to be a
difficult road ahead. That's precisely why we need to force the question of
our value proposition."

Another part of that question needs to be graduation rates, he said, echoing
President Obama's statements about the importance of completion rates for
all students. "Low graduation rates go to the heart of value proposition
because you can't make a very good case for yourself if 85 percent of the
people who start in a freshman class are gone by senior year," he said.

Wilson praised the efforts of Philander Smith College and its president,
Walter Kimbrough,
<http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/07/14/blackmale>to adopt a
series of new policies and programs to raise the graduation rates
of black male students. "I think the crisis of attrition is noteworthy, but
what is as, if not more, noteworthy is the fact that he is creatively
instituting a program that addresses that problem and he's going after it,
and making it a priority," Wilson said. "There are a lot of institutions
that have not had a creative response to some of the more difficult problems
on their campuses, and that's not just HBCU's. That's what leadership and
governance require."

While the discussion ahead may be challenging, Wilson stressed that
financial stability -- and eventual financial strength -- won't happen
without this discussion. "I don't think a stronger financial base is
remotely possible in the absence of a review of the value proposition issue,
a fundamental overhaul of the value proposition."
 — Scott Jaschik <scott.jaschik at insidehighered.com>