As assistant vice president for development at a historically Black college/university (HBCU), I have made it a point as part of the graduation process at my university to personally speak with every graduating senior that I come into contact with to convey a matter of utmost importance for their beloved institution: Supporting their alma mater as they move forward in their careers.
The charge I give to all graduating seniors who will take the time to listen is compelling and necessary if the HBCU sector is to obtain enhanced corporate-sector resources from graduates in the future. For the record, becoming an internal champion/supporter on behalf of their alma mater is not mutually exclusive to the HBCU sector, but is a function that every graduate should perform. However, HBCUs, like some majority small colleges and universities across the United State simply do not have the name recognition that other institutions have earned over the years. As a result, those institutions now enjoy productive relationships and partnerships with the nation’s corporate sector.
Millions of dollars are given annually to assist prestigious public and private research-driven and liberal arts colleges and universities. One strategic aspect of this kind of giving relationship is that these institutions have produced human capital employed by corporations, and over the course of the years these individuals have moved up the corporate chain to decision-making positions. This kind of corporate philanthropic giving/investment paradigm is simple yet complex in its longitudinal process — these individuals perform the role of corporate champions on behalf of their alma mater, benefiting the school’s philanthropic private-dollar resources.
I ask graduating students to rethink and therefore reassess the institution from which they are about to earn their degree — a degree which took hard work and in some cases sheer determination to earn, and represents a significant achievement. They should be forever mindful that at the apex of this process of skill development was the institution, nurturing the student’s potential for leadership.
