On Thursday, September 22, we participated in a panel discussion that was hosted by the Brookings Institution, which recently published a report entitled A Call To Action for HBCU Investment on how historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) can drive neighborhood development and grow their endowments with increased access to capital from community development financial institutions (CDFIs), traditional banks, and philanthropy. Faced with significantly lower endowments compared to their predominately white peer institutions, HBCUs have less capacity to generate non-tuition revenue using the “town and gown” method that has catapulted other institutions to supersized stakeholders in their cities. If only these postsecondary institutions could connect with more sources of growth capital, a mutual benefit between HBCUs and the communities surrounding them can be had.
Dr. Andre M. Perry
The report’s findings call for financial institutions to recognize opportunities and potential returns that investing in HBCUs would yield if not for a system that (perpetuates?) past discrimination.
“Harvard University issued a report recently about its role in using Black enslaved labor to build their endowment, you know, $40 billion,” said panelist Dr. Gregory Vincent, president of Talladega College. Vincent shared that many universities understand their privilege and are trying to atone for past aggrievances. “So all of these institutions have made a moral commitment to work with HBCUs and we need to hold them accountable for living up to those issues. Because…their balance sheets were built on the backs of Black people.”
However, discrimination is not only in the past but also complicating the present-day impact potential of the 102 HBCUs still operating. Last year, the Tennessee legislature determined that the HBCU Tennessee State University never received an estimated $500 million it had been entitled to from the state’s higher education funding scheme. Also in 2021, the Maryland General Assembly agreed to give $577 million to HBCUs Morgan State University, Coppin State University, Bowie State University, and the University of Maryland Eastern Shore because of systemic underfunding. This month, Florida A&M (FAMU) students sued the state alleging that the predominately white University of Florida received a larger state appropriation per student than FAMU from 1987 to 2020, resulting in an accumulated disparity of approximately $1.3 billion.
