This is my question. I hear all kind of people lauding the HBCU experience and seem utterly enraptured with the idea that they will be able to spend the four years of their undergraduate experience with people who share their same ethnic background. 1st question: Is this at all representative of real life? From my personal experience I have found that we, or at least in the upwardly socio-economic realm that you high achieving and socially conscious African-American (predominantly) hope to take part in, live in a white world. How will an HBCU where you will be surrounded by people like you and taught be professors like you be at all representative of real life? Or at least the one you hope to be living?
My 2nd question involves personal and academic preference. I have been accepted into a number of Universities and can go anywhere I want. So what would make me want to attend a HBCU rather than a more traditional Ivy League school or one of its equivalents when my goals is to become as educated as possible and subsequently be the most qualified for any future position or work that I would like to pursue. Furthermore, how diverse can an HBCU be and how much can you learn about other cultures/environments when you are surrounded my only one megaculture?
hmm lemme see whas so great about hbcus??????
-family(ivy league schools dont care about u as a person they jus want u for numbers)
-academics(u can get the same education from howard that u can get from harvard)
fun-(picture having fun and chillin' wit ivy league brat)
and jus being around people tha tyou know u can have a great college experience with. everywhere u go will be diversified. at an ivy league school all you gonna meet is smart uptight brats and all they wanna do is be betta than you. so we live in a white world..........that doesnt mean we have to spend OUR college experience co-existing unhappily with them. trust me it is better to go where you are happy then to go where u are miserable. look at the statistics people that go to ivy league schools are miserable they go through so much stress and hard work that education becomes a strain rather than beneficial. but if u think u as a black woman would be more happy at an ivy league school than by all means go. if u wanna spend college being surrounded by geeks than go. if u wanna spend college being a NUMBER than go. but nothin can top the experience of an hbcu...nothing can beat chillin on the yard...nothing can beat goin to a real greek party...nothing can beat chillin in a student center where everybody isnt studying all the time......nothin can beat goin to a probate.....nothing can beat being around your people college doesnt have to all be about getting ahead and being the best at everything. it can be about building friendships too. it can be about having fun too. and at a hbcu (HOWARD) u can get the best of both worlds. or u can go to an ivy and be anotha geek. nothing can beat an HBCU
This is my question. I hear all kind of people lauding the HBCU experience and seem utterly enraptured with the idea that they will be able to spend the four years of their undergraduate experience with people who share their same ethnic background. 1st question: Is this at all representative of real life? From my personal experience I have found that we, or at least in the upwardly socio-economic realm that you high achieving and socially conscious African-American (predominantly) hope to take part in, live in a white world. How will an HBCU where you will be surrounded by people like you and taught be professors like you be at all representative of real life? Or at least the one you hope to be living?
My 2nd question involves personal and academic preference. I have been accepted into a number of Universities and can go anywhere I want. So what would make me want to attend a HBCU rather than a more traditional Ivy League school or one of its equivalents when my goals is to become as educated as possible and subsequently be the most qualified for any future position or work that I would like to pursue. Furthermore, how diverse can an HBCU be and how much can you learn about other cultures/environments when you are surrounded my only one megaculture?
Your question sounds complicated, but in reality, it is quite simple.
The answer? Are all black people the same? No. HBCU's are not stricken with only having one 'megaculture'. Sure there are plenty of ignorant ****, but there are more subcultures in the African American community that you could possibly believe. And what makes you think that black people only conform to black views? Be more open. You are more likely to run into those problems attending Ivy League than an HBCU for an undergrad.
But the lack of Latinos causes the most culture pain.
Need more.
Thunder
hmm lemme see whas so great about hbcus??????
-family(ivy league schools dont care about u as a person they jus want u for numbers)
-academics(u can get the same education from howard that u can get from harvard)
fun-(picture having fun and chillin' wit ivy league brat)
and jus being around people tha tyou know u can have a great college experience with. everywhere u go will be diversified. at an ivy league school all you gonna meet is smart uptight brats and all they wanna do is be betta than you. so we live in a white world..........that doesnt mean we have to spend OUR college experience co-existing unhappily with them. trust me it is better to go where you are happy then to go where u are miserable. look at the statistics people that go to ivy league schools are miserable they go through so much stress and hard work that education becomes a strain rather than beneficial. but if u think u as a black woman would be more happy at an ivy league school than by all means go. if u wanna spend college being surrounded by geeks than go. if u wanna spend college being a NUMBER than go. but nothin can top the experience of an hbcu...nothing can beat chillin on the yard...nothing can beat goin to a real greek party...nothing can beat chillin in a student center where everybody isnt studying all the time......nothin can beat goin to a probate.....nothing can beat being around your people college doesnt have to all be about getting ahead and being the best at everything. it can be about building friendships too. it can be about having fun too. and at a hbcu (HOWARD) u can get the best of both worlds. or u can go to an ivy and be anotha geek. nothing can beat an HBCU
wow... this is the most sensible thing he has said on this whole board... i can actually agree w/ him... :arrow:
that's a good response
Well stated about the megaculture, Thunder. Put southerners, the westerners, rich kids and poor kids, republicans, africans, carribean-latino identifying blacks, churchgoers, followers of islam, and atheists in the same dorm and you've got a cast worthy of MTV's the Real World.
As far as choosing an HBCU, it really depends on why you're attending school. If you're just in school to get a job, then by all means go with the "name-school". Many HBCU students attend college with aspirations and inspirations that are influenced by family traditions, a respect for the historical significance of HBCU's, a longing to improve social strata or to eliminate the pressure from the academically competitive nature of top white and asian students. Some just go to surround themselves with positive, intelligent black people.
Reading US News and World Report or the Carnegie report, a prospective student would believe that the education at HBCU's is not competitive. However, one must consider that magazines are a form of media and thus are influenced by who is telling the story. The awards of our students and legacy of our alumni proves that HBCU's are doing a great job of educating students and preparing them for success.
I longed to go to an HBCU because the HBCU alumni list at the time was a who's who list of black america and black history:
Phylicia Rashad, Debbie Allen, Oprah Winfrey, Earl Graves (founder of Black Enterprise), Charles Hamilton Houston, Thurgood Marshall, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Martin Luther King, Jr., Former US Surgeon General David Satcher, Marva Collins, Brown University President Ruth J. Simmons, Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, Alice Walker, Jesse Jackson, Kweisi Mfume, Branford Marsalis, NC Governor Mike Easley, former VA governor and current mayor L. Douglas Wilder, and countless others.
Currently, the next generation of black leaders is being forged among the younger set. Howard's moot court team just knocked off highly regarded Harvard's team in the American Bar Association Mock Trial Competition. A former classmate from NCCU is on that team.
NCCU's campus newspaper, The Campus Echo, just won several awards in journalism from the Society of Professional Journalists, including #1 Online Non-Daily for the mid-atlantic states.
Howard continually produces Rhodes Scholars, including four in the past four years. FSU's Master of Business Administration team has been invited to participate in the International Business Plan Competition sponsored by Moot Corp, whose slots are normally reserved for the most prestigious schools in the country. VUU had a student place first in a recent statewide Phi Beta Lambda conference. Hampton University is building a Proton Beam Therapy Center (this will only be the fourth one in the country). Our legacy continues. . .
Sorry about the length of the post.
Well stated about the megaculture, Thunder. Put southerners, the westerners, rich kids and poor kids, republicans, africans, carribean-latino identifying blacks, churchgoers, followers of islam, and atheists in the same dorm and you've got a cast worthy of MTV's the Real World.
As far as choosing an HBCU, it really depends on why you're attending school. If you're just in school to get a job, then by all means go with the "name-school". Many HBCU students attend college with aspirations and inspirations that are influenced by family traditions, a respect for the historical significance of HBCU's, a longing to improve social strata or to eliminate the pressure from the academically competitive nature of top white and asian students. Some just go to surround themselves with positive, intelligent black people.
Reading US News and World Report or the Carnegie report, a prospective student would believe that the education at HBCU's is not competitive. However, one must consider that magazines are a form of media and thus are influenced by who is telling the story. The awards of our students and legacy of our alumni proves that HBCU's are doing a great job of educating students and preparing them for success.
I longed to go to an HBCU because the HBCU alumni list at the time was a who's who list of black america and black history:
Phylicia Rashad, Debbie Allen, Oprah Winfrey, Earl Graves (founder of Black Enterprise), Charles Hamilton Houston, Thurgood Marshall, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Martin Luther King, Jr., Former US Surgeon General David Satcher, Marva Collins, Brown University President Ruth J. Simmons, Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, Alice Walker, Jesse Jackson, Kweisi Mfume, Branford Marsalis, NC Governor Mike Easley, former VA governor and current mayor L. Douglas Wilder, and countless others.
Currently, the next generation of black leaders is being forged among the younger set. Howard's moot court team just knocked off highly regarded Harvard's team in the American Bar Association Mock Trial Competition. A former classmate from NCCU is on that team.
NCCU's campus newspaper, The Campus Echo, just won several awards in journalism from the Society of Professional Journalists, including #1 Online Non-Daily for the mid-atlantic states.
Howard continually produces Rhodes Scholars, including four in the past four years. FSU's Master of Business Administration team has been invited to participate in the International Business Plan Competition sponsored by Moot Corp, whose slots are normally reserved for the most prestigious schools in the country. VUU had a student place first in a recent statewide Phi Beta Lambda conference. Hampton University is building a Proton Beam Therapy Center (this will only be the fourth one in the country). Our legacy continues. . .
Sorry about the length of the post.
That was well said. My mom just told me about an article she read stating that most African Americans in the coporate workplace come from HBCUs.
