President Edington kicked off the HBCU Futures Conference at the University of the District of Columbia on Sept. 28 by speaking to the origins of Historically Black Colleges and Universities and the impact they’ve had on Black students.
The conference served as an opportunity to engage with HBCU students, faculty, alumni and staff.
The President noted that before and after the Civil War, HBCUs were founded to give Black Americans the opportunity to attain an education and transform their lives.
“From the inception of the country’s first HBCU in 1837, in Cheyney, Pennsylvania, to the scores of historically Black institutions that educate today’s scholars, HBCUs have always represented opportunity.”
These colleges and universities are not an effort to self-segregate but a place to bring together ideas and individuals around the pillars of academic excellence, cultural expression and self-discovery. We are institutions committed to social mobility, workforce diversity and affirming the next generations of Black leaders.
“Our institutions have long been an instrumental force in promoting the upward mobility of Black Americans, consistently producing some of our best and brightest scholars,” the president said.
HBCUs are responsible for educating more economically disadvantaged students than most universities even though HBCUs comprise only three percent of the nation’s colleges and universities, Edington said. In fact, they have educated “12.5 percent of Black CEOs, 40 percent of Black engineers, 50 percent of Black lawyers, 70 percent of Black doctors, 80 percent of Black judges and scores of university leaders.”
UDC Board of Trustee member Barrington D. Scott was also a featured speaker. He pointed out that UDC is the second oldest HBCU, established in 1851.
Scott listed a number of UDC alumni, including Amadou Gallo Fall, the president of the Basketball Africa League. He noted that in 1982, UDC won the National Division II Basketball Championship and that UDC hosts the NCAA Championship on campus.
Former DC Police Chief Cathy Lanier, the first female to head up the security for the NFL, is a UDC alum. So is John Thompson, the legendary Georgetown University basketball coach. Thompson was the first Black coach to win a national title.
Other notable alumni Scott mentioned were Nadine Winter, who served on the first elected DC Council; Rev. Lennox Yearwood, president and CEO of the Hip-Hop Caucus; Brian Thompson, who designed the new $100 bill; DJ Frank Ski, former LA Lakers basketball player Earl Jones, Euphemia Lofton Haynes, the first African-American woman to get a Ph.D. in mathematics; and Dr. E.B. Henderson, the grandfather of Black basketball.