Why America Needs Its HBCUs

“Part of this is historical. If you look at the ecosystem around HBCUs, our grads give back in other ways that are not necessarily financial. They tend to go back to lower-income parts of the United States—or their home countries—and they tend to give back in spades in service. If you look at graduates of Morehouse School of Medicine, Meharry Medical College, and Howard School of Medicine, those graduates are more likely to serve in underserved areas. That means that their income levels are going to be lower as a result; and there’s still significant income inequality and discrimination in what African American women would get paid compared to what a white male would get paid. And then when you look at unemployment rates, it’s still almost twice that for African Americans than it is for the rest of the population. So what that means is that the actual amount of dollars that they can give back themselves is a bit suppressed.”