The New York Times April 1, 2017 Why I Chose a Historically Black College By Skylar Mitchell "A black school? But you're so smart, you could go anywhere." That was the reaction I got when I told some high school friends that I would attend Spelman, a historically black women's college in Atlanta. I know they thought they were complimenting me. At first, I tried to justify my decision, pointing to the college's notable alumnae and research opportunities. But the fact that Spelman is the nation's top-ranked historically black college was lost on them. I couldn't make my peers understand the experience of a black student in an overwhelmingly white school. I couldn't convey the significance of historically black colleges and universities. I wasn't interested in Spelman when I first visited. I was in the eighth grade and my heart was set on the Northeast Ivies. I knew I wanted extensive study-abroad options, a core curriculum and at least a 10 percent black student population. That last item was nonnegotiable. That year during spring break, my mom took my brother and me to Atlanta to sightsee. "Your nana would want you to see this school," my mom said as we pulled up to Spelman's gate. "You don't have to go, but you are going to see it." My parents' shared premium on education bonded them as graduate students at the University of Southern California in the 1990s. Two New Yorkers pursuing their master's and doctorates, they saw school as the surest way to attain security. It was never a question that I was going to college. Hard work, I was taught, would ensure as many choices as possible. That level of pressure was the norm in Montgomery County, Md., just outside Washington, D.C., where I grew up. It is one of the wealthiest and best-educated counties in the country. It is also largely segregated and fiercely competitive. I grew up surrounded by so much privilege it was possible for many residents to ignore race and class inequality entirely. After all, the nation's first black president lived 12 miles away. So, despite the racial violence that was making headlines, my friends seemed to believe Montgomery County was post-racial. "It's sad but it's a good thing we don't have those problems here," a classmate said the day after Trayvon Martin was murdered. It was clear to me, but not to many of my peers, that the community was still very much influenced by stereotypes and misconceptions about race. When I tried to talk to my classmates about that, they tended to be defensive. Being one of the few black kids in my school was all I'd ever known before college. Having my hair teasingly prodded during recess or being called "oreo" felt normal. From 7 a.m. until 4 p.m., I learned to excuse small indignities, and I used humor as a defense mechanism. When I got home, I could finally vent to the few other people who understood. My mother was very clear: "Don't let anyone touch your hair and you better not let them call you outside of your name." As I got older, I felt less and less like I belonged. When I started taking AP courses and showing up to the same college info sessions as many of my classmates, they made jokes about quotas and affirmative action, as if they hadn't seen me studying right alongside them for years. One classmate even asked me to give up my spot on the morning announcements because "I didn't need anything extra" for my college applications anyway. It wasn't the comments that bothered me so much as the fact that they came from people I knew. They had seen how hard I worked to maintain an advanced course load and leadership positions. My grandmother, the eighth of 13 children raised on a tobacco farm in Yanceyville, N.C., was the first of her siblings to leave home. In 1960, she graduated from Shaw University, the oldest HBCU in the South, and dissatisfied with the limited opportunities for a black woman in her Jim Crow state, moved to New York to teach. She sought to realize her best self while being seen as an individual. Her daughter, my mother, sought something similar when she left her predominantly white neighborhood on Long Island, N.Y. She went to Georgetown University but took her first African-American studies courses across the city at Howard University. Even though she loved Georgetown, it was at Howard that she was finally able to learn in a context that validated her history and identity. I ended up applying to nearly 20 colleges, and got into some great schools like Swarthmore, but Spelman kept pulling me back. I had never met professors or college administrators who looked like me or who seemed so genuinely interested in what I had to say. On a visit, I remember sitting in on an "African Diaspora and the World" class - a required course for freshmen on racial formation, colonization and capitalism - and not second-guessing myself before I spoke. I did not worry that the class might think my questions were "hypersensitive" or "hostile." When I was offered a full scholarship and a spot in the honors program, I accepted immediately. There is something powerful about attending an institution that was built for you. Most colleges were built for white students, or at least, with only white students in mind. At Spelman, I found a place for myself in the curriculum, and an opening to learn what it means to be me. Skylar Mitchell is a sophomore at Spelman College SANDRA M. PHOENIX HBCU Library Alliance Executive Director Atlanta University Center Robert W. Woodruff Library 111 James P. Brawley Drive SW Atlanta, GA 30314 404-978-2118 (office) 404-702-5854 (cell) http://www.hbculibraries.org/ sphoenix@hbculibraries.org<mailto:sphoenix@hbculibraries.org<mailto:sphoenix@hbculibraries.org%3cmailto:sphoenix@hbculibraries.org>> Honor the ancestors, honor the children. Follow us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hbculibraryalliance1/ and Twitter https://twitter.com/HBCULibAlliance Check out "PULSE!" The HBCU Library Alliance's News Source! - https://hbculibraryalliance.wordpress.com/