Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has outlined a plan to fund and support 107 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) if she’s elected president. In a recently published op-ed for Roots, Clinton laid out her plans to provide $25 billion in funding to support both public and privately owned HBCU’s.
Part of Clinton’s plan includes the creation of more scholarships to cater for minority students and the expansion of on-campus child care facilities to encourage parents, especially mothers, to stay in school and pursue a degree.
In the United States, HBCU’s are a group of institutions of higher education established before 1964 with the intention of primarily serving the African-American community at the height of racial segregation in the country.
Most HBCU’s were created in the aftermath of the American Civil War and are located in former slave states in the South.
Clinton’s op-ed praised the contributions of the HBCU’s to the U.S. educational system, acknowledging that the schools graduate almost half of America’s Black teachers, who have in turn helped educate millions of African-Americans.
Clinton observed that during the past few decades, increasing numbers of Americans from every background have pursued higher education, yet the African-American community is still lags behind in overall enrollment numbers.
“Black students are still less likely to graduate within six years, and they are significantly more likely to need to work part time while in school. So we need to do more to close the gaps and give all our kids the best chance to succeed.”
In order to close gaps, Clinton promised to provide some form of tuition-free education:
First, we’ll make college much more affordable—and in many cases, we’ll make it completely tuition-free. I worked with Senator Bernie Sanders on a plan to make sure every student whose family makes under $125,000 can attend an in-state public university tuition-free, and all students can attend community college tuition-free. And we’ll work toward making sure students attending public HBCUs never have to take out loans to cover the other costs of obtaining a degree, like textbooks, activities, and living expenses.
Clinton enjoys massive support from the African-American community. In fact, her victory against fellow Democratic party candidate Bernie Sanders in the party primaries was partly due to the overwhelming support she received from Black voters. Ahead of the November 8th elections, Clinton’s polling among Black voters remains in the upper double digits compared to her opponent, Republican candidate Donald Trump, who has continued to hover in the single digits.
