When Gwendolyn Denwiddie graduated from Fisk University in May, her accomplishments exceeded the bachelor’s degree she raised above her head in celebration. Denwiddie had succeeded at something that other Fisk students had been attempting for more than a decade.
She revived The Fisk Forum, a student newspaper that had not been published since 1998.
The English major from Jackson, Tenn., had been determined since her freshman year to restart the paper, and, finally, in her senior year, after watching several other attempts fizzle, she made it happen.
“It was a united effort with the student government association,” Denwiddie says. “I took the position of SGA publications director, and, fortunately, the SGA president was supportive — part of her platform when she ran for office was to bring back the student newspaper.”
So Denwiddie put together a staff and sought the help of a professional, Fisk alumna Nancy DeVille, a reporter with the local paper, The Tennessean. The result was a monthly news magazine, a departure from the erstwhile weekly newspaper, but a publication, nevertheless. “We were only able to get it out monthly, so we couldn’t include real news stories, and we weren’t able to get the website going. That’s the next step for the new editors.”
Denwiddie’s efforts were laudable, given the backdrop of drama taking place at Fisk. President Hazel O’Leary has spent the past five years in a court battle over the historically Black university’s efforts to sell a valuable art collection that was donated to the institution in 1949. Meanwhile, a report by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, an accreditation body, has cited the school for its financial difficulties.
At many HBCUs, students like Denwiddie have invested time and energy into keeping their online and print publications afloat or reviving them from dormancy. In her case, the efforts paid off, but at other schools the results are often less fruitful.
