HBCU students rally to save Bennett College
11th February 2019 · 0 Comments
By Victoria Clark
Contributing Writer
It was an HBCU rally like few had seen before. Students, faculty and staff of the 105 remaining historically Black universities and colleges came to the rescue of a sister institution, Bennett College in Greensboro, N.C., with the hashtag #StandWithBennett. And on Feb. 1, 2019, the all-women HBCU, founded in 1873, raised $8.2 million to keep its doors open and to continue to educate young Black women.
“Bennett students left campus for the winter break, armed with letters asking their family, friends and church members to support Bennett College,” said Laurie Willis, the head of communications at Bennett College.
“Certainly, no student was happy about the news, but they were brave in the face of trouble and asked the president what they could do to help,” Willis said.
Celebrities from radio host Tom Joyner to actor and singer Jussie Smollett urged the Black community to donate anywhere from $1 to thousands to meet a $5 million deficit set by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC). Without raising the funds or meeting other requirements, Bennett would have lost its accreditation and ultimately would close. Louisiana HBCUs also actively worked to support their fellow institution by signing petitions and hosting fundraising events.
“Being at an HBCU has helped me benefit from learning from people that look like me,” said Piper Thurman, a Xavier University student who signed a petition very early on to keep Bennett open. “So, to see Bennett close was something I didn’t want to see, even if it meant I had no money to donate,” Thurman said.
HBCU students created GoFundMe campaigns and Cash App accounts for collective donations for Bennett. For those students who could not donate money, they signed petitions directed to the accrediting body to share their testimonies about why HBCUs are important, and why SACS should keep the institution open.
On Dec. 11, 2018, Bennett received the news that they were removed from the list of accredited schools, after a two-year probation. They were told then, that they needed to raise a minimum of $5 million to demonstrate financial stability. Immediately, Bennett students and staff sprung to action. Willis explained that students organized events and issued challenges to neighboring HBCUs like North Carolina A&T University and Livingstone College.
As one of two remaining HBCUs for women, the college found itself in this crisis because of enrollment struggles even though the school just had a 15-percent increase in student life. Major budget deficits meant the school could not meet basic financial requirements to remain accredited.
Even though a lot of the fundraising activities took place on social media, some schools held campus events to support the national effort. The Student Government Association’s Political Actions Committee at Dillard University organized a fundraiser on Jan. 31, 2019 to support Bennett. The committee sold plates for $4, and reported the event was sold out. All proceeds went to Bennett College’s official Cash App for the fundraiser. Toiya Smith, the head of the committee, explained that she felt it was important for HBCUs to stand together because they support the Black community.
“I view the HBCU experience as a safe and inclusive space for Black men and women to cultivate their passions. Our institutions are the Black community,” Smith said.
Black institutions have always been havens for minority students, because of their representation and inclusion. More importantly, they serve a student population that has more needs that prevent them from pursuing college elsewhere. According to the American Council on Education, HBCUs educate students that are 74-percent Pell Grant-eligible, and at the same time, they are widely underfunded because they have smaller endowments, and private donations. HBCUs have a hard time with meeting some accreditation standards, not because of academics alone, but because of finances, Walter Kimbrough, the president of Dillard University explained.
“It’s never about academic programs. The main issue HBCUs have with accreditation is financial,” Kimbrough said. “So, it is a tough job but we have to continue to own this mission because many students would not have great educational opportunities without HBCUs.”
With High Point University donating $1 million to reach the $5 million required, on Feb. 2, the school announced that its doors would remain open. According to Willis, companies are still donating to the school.
“There were literally thousands of thousands of supporters for the #StandWithBennett Fundraising Campaign,” Willis said, “Bennett College appreciates every single dollar that was donated.”
Future plans for the school’s financial stability start with Bennet participating in a six-year loan deferment program with the Department of Education from 2018 to 2023 to make sure the crisis does not happen again. The principal and interest payments will be deferred, and the principal balance will remain at the same level from when the deferment began, officials said. The university is also taking its own in-house precautions to avoid the issue happening again in the future.
“Bennett College’s board of trustees has assembled a Bennett College re-engineering committee,” said LaDaniel Gatling II, the vice president for institutional advancement at Bennett, “that will be charged with positioning Bennett College for long-term sustainability by building competitive academic offerings, increasing operational efficiencies, changing the business model, and enhancing institutional effectiveness,” Gatling said.
This article originally published in the February 11, 2019 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
