Where is the Outrage? Black Men Are Vanishing from Our HBCUs
Imagine it: institutions born of resistance, places where our ancestors’ hopes rose from oppression’s ashes, yet now, they’re becoming places where Black men are increasingly absent. Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) were born to preserve and elevate Black minds, to ensure the light of learning in the midst of systems meant to deny it. But today, Black men make up only about 26% of HBCU attendees, a shocking decline from the 38% recorded in 1976. Meanwhile, non-Black enrollment at HBCUs has swelled from 15% in the late '70s to 24% today. What does it say about our institutions, our priorities, that they serve fewer and fewer Black men with each passing year?
“It’s as if we have turned away,” says Howard University alum and author Ibram X. Kendi. “We’ve turned our backs on those who need these institutions most—on our brothers, our fathers, our sons.”
This crisis ought to be igniting a firestorm. These institutions are ours. They’re run by us, governed by Black leaders, meant to be a safe haven for Black men and women alike. But we’ve allowed Black men, the very backbone of our communities, to slowly become statistical ghosts in spaces that were once theirs by birthright. Where is the outrage? Why aren’t we demanding answers?
“We’ve turned our backs on those who need these institutions most—on our brothers, our fathers, our sons.”
The Decline of Black Male Enrollment
The statistics paint a sobering picture. A report by the American Institute for Boys and Men indicates that financial barriers, inadequate K-12 preparation, and a lack of Black male teachers are among the key factors deterring Black men from enrolling in HBCUs. HBCUs have historically been places of refuge and empowerment, but today, far too many Black men simply aren’t arriving at their doors.
According to data from the National Center for Education Statistics, Black men now represent a smaller percentage of HBCU attendees than non-Black students. When did the needs of our brothers become so peripheral, so easily sacrificed on the altar of complacency?
“We used to be protectors of Black male intellect,” notes Dr. Marybeth Gasman, a leading HBCU historian at Rutgers University. “We have to ask ourselves, what changed? Where did we fail?”
“We used to be protectors of Black male intellect”
A Lack of Urgency, A Failure of Responsibility
In his essay "The Case for Reparations," Ta-Nehisi Coates reminds us of the importance of reckoning with our own legacies. As Coates might write, we are the inheritors of a responsibility, charged with preserving and uplifting our community. We are obligated to confront hard truths about how we manage and care for the legacies we’re entrusted with.
“When we talk about accountability,” Coates might say, “it isn’t just for outsiders. It’s for us. It’s for those who preside over these institutions, who have made pledges to serve our people but have allowed Black men to drift away.”
Our apathy allows these institutions, which once stood as symbols of Black hope and progress, to betray their very mission. How can we expect these men to graduate as leaders and advocates when the very institutions designed to protect and prepare them fail to address their most basic needs? The silence in the face of this decline is damning. The absence of outrage is haunting.
Institutional Betrayal and Community Silence
There was a time when HBCUs were sacred ground for Black men, places that could cultivate a W.E.B. Du Bois or a Martin Luther King Jr. Today, that promise feels like a relic. If HBCUs don’t work for Black men, then who will? If we don’t make this our collective priority, if Black America doesn’t wake up to this erosion of opportunity, who will?
Eddie Glaude, professor and chair of Princeton’s African American Studies department, asks, “Where are the leaders who should be ringing the alarm?” He sees the silence as a betrayal, a collective failure of purpose. “We are losing a generation of Black men to indifference. We can’t simply pass this problem on, hoping someone else will care enough to solve it.”
Glaude’s warning strikes at the heart of the issue. Black America has grown accustomed to seeing HBCUs as monoliths, places that will always endure, regardless of our engagement or investment. But these institutions are not immune to crisis. They cannot serve our community if they are hollowed out from the inside.
“Where are the leaders who should be ringing the alarm?”
Who Will Stand for Our Brothers?
This isn’t just an academic issue. It’s a matter of survival. When Black men are systematically erased from educational spaces, when their absence becomes normal, what happens to our communities? Who will stand for our brothers, if not us?
“The world will never take us seriously if we can’t take ourselves seriously,” says Dr. Harry L. Williams, CEO of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund. “We need to get Black men into these institutions. We need to fight for them. We need to remind everyone that our sons are worth every dollar, every policy change, every ounce of effort we can muster.”
But where are the policies to support them? Where is the scholarship funding, the mentoring, the pipeline from K-12 to these venerable institutions? Where is the comprehensive effort to bring Black men back to HBCUs? Who among us is willing to stand in the gap, to demand better from our leaders, from our institutions, and from ourselves?
A Call to Action
HBCUs were once bastions of Black empowerment. But now they must make a choice—will they remain indifferent as Black men slip further into the periphery, or will they confront the factors that have created this crisis?
The time for complacency has passed. We can no longer afford to ignore the growing absence of Black men in institutions meant to uplift our people. We need to be angry, we need to be loud, and most of all, we need to be insistent. We need to place Black men back at the heart of HBCU missions, where they rightfully belong.
Our survival depends on it.
Sources:
American Institute for Boys and Men. "HBCUs at a Crossroads: Addressing the Decline in Black Male Enrollment." August 22, 2024. AIBM
National Center for Education Statistics. "Fast Facts: Historically Black Colleges and Universities (667)." Accessed November 1, 2024. National Center for Education Statistics
Inside Higher Ed. "Decades of Enrollment Declines for Black Men at HBCUs." September 9, 2024. Inside Higher Ed
Coates, Ta-Nehisi. "The Case for Reparations." The Atlantic, June 2014.
Glaude, Eddie S. "Begin Again: James Baldwin's America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own." Crown, 2020.
Kendi, Ibram X. "How to Be an Antiracist." One World, 2019.
Williams, Harry L. "The Role of HBCUs in the 21st Century." Thurgood Marshall College Fund, 2021.
Gasman, Marybeth. "Envisioning Black Colleges: A History of the United Negro College Fund." Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007.
National Center for Education Statistics. "Fall Enrollment in Degree-Granting Historically Black Colleges and Universities, by Sex of Student and Control and Level of Institution: Selected Years, 1976 Through 2020." Accessed November 1, 2024. National Center for Education Statistics
Inside Higher Ed. "College Leaders Seek to Boost Enrollment of Black Men." September 27, 2021. Inside Higher Ed
