| Madison, Wisconsin is one of the most diverse places I have ever seen. The people there all come from so many different backgrounds and cultures that you can become friends with almost anyone. I grew up there, in a house that in and of itself was a cultural Mecca. I met and lived with girls from every walk of life due to my mother';s amazing job as a foster mother for Dane County. Although I lived only a block from the public school, Black Hawk, my parents chose to send me to a private school on the other side of town that was inhabited with mostly other middle to working class families. Needless to say there were only about a handful of African American students there. My experience at that school taught me quite a bit about how to build relationships with people of all kinds, but I felt as if I was severely lacking something that my foster sisters seem to have an abundance of. I was lacking a personal interaction with other African American students my age. Everyone in my family was born in the south, even my older brother, and I was simply the odd ball. My mother and father only spoke of one thing my whole life, their education at an HBCU. HBCU stands for Historically Black College or University, and since I was little, I was told of the good times they had there. The Greek Step shows, the football games, the dorms and the food were all things that they cherished during their stay at Stillman College. They filled my head with wonderful stories of how they spent days under Stillman's ancient magnolia trees, the ones that had been there for generations. Sometimes the information they each told me clashed with one another, like how my father first talked to my mother in front of her dorm, or how she "dropped" her engagement ring out of the third floor window after a fight. The point is that no matter how the story changes or clashes, it has been embedded into my memory. Their history turned into my dream of meeting in the same fashion, although my version will coincide with his a little better than theirs. As my senior year of high school approached, I started to consider colleges that I could attend. In the back of my mind was always Stillman. I honed my fundamental skills, the ones that would get me through my first years of college. My friends stayed diverse, my teachers just as multicultural and I remained enamored with the idea of being around "my people." When my senior year ended, I came to Alabama bubbling with excitement about how I was finally going to be with other Black students that were trying to better themselves. I arrived at Stillman College in time for orientation, but something about the Stillman community was different than I expected. The campus wasn't as Black as I had assumed it would have been! The teachers and students were from everywhere, and my fellow freshmen weren't just of African American decent. There were Mexicans, white people, black people, biracial people and even kids from Ireland on the campus. I had come to a school that was no different than the one I had left in high school. I was right back where I started, but the atmosphere was different here. The little cliques were eliminated; the division of stereotypes no longer divided us as a student body. Age didn't even seem to be a factor now. So what about this HBCU had attracted me so much, if it was not the thought of being near people that were more like me? My first year at college was a massive blur, as it seems to be for every college student. I spent days studying, getting good grades and being the honor student that I was expected to be. The difference between my education in Wisconsin and my education here at an HBCU is the teacher's ability to connect with the students in every way. They are here working with us one on one, building friendships, being advisors, and meeting parents. My teachers have done more than just teach me the material; they've made sure that I could relate whatever the subject was to my everyday life. My papers aren'';t just corrected with that infamous red ink; they come with an appointment to discuss what I did right and what I did wrong. Everyone knows my name here, they know my major, they give suggestions for internships and do so much more than what they are paid for. I have even had the pleasure of having a teacher cook for our class on numerous occasions while we all took our finals. The education at liberal arts HBCUs are about discussion rather then just getting the facts. You debate almost everything that comes along, so not only are you learning, but so are your teachers. Before Stillman College I had never seen an African American with a PHD outside of my family. Seeing that type of thing helped motivate me. In short, all of my teachers show me how to be a role model by being one themselves. I am proud to be studying at an HBCU because my experience here is just as good, if not better than someone else's. Night, however, is a completely different beast. I go to dances in the Hay center, BBQs in the quad, pep rallies and football games with more school spirit than I had ever imagined possible, even the Alumni were out partying with us during homecoming! The stories I had heard from my parents were true, but it wasn't just an old story now; I was living it. Everything here is the same, yet so different from anything I have ever experienced. We do dances like the kang wang, the shuffle, the electric slide version 2.0 and the bunny hop. Now don't think that it's the same old bunny hop that you saw old people doing; it has more leg movements and body rolls then can count. My time at Stillman College has taught me one thing: it was not simply the interactions of my fellow African American students that I thought I was missing, but it was the ability to take part in the generations worth of traditions and what they stood for that I was truly missing. |
| HBCUs: Tradition, understanding, and education by Faith Stevenson |
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