St. Aug’s alum: Merger between these 2 NC HBCUs will help save both | Opinion

It’s understandable that alumni of both St. Augustine’s and Shaw universities are aghast at the prospect of merging the two financially struggling schools.

Birthed almost before the smoke from the Civil War had cleared to educate the formerly enslaved and their descendants, both schools have sent forth into the world illustrious alumni whose names and accomplishments resonate far beyond North Carolina.

They’re equally important, though, as incubators for those whose names will seldom make the newspapers, but who improve the world one state, city or community at a time. Though I only attended St. Aug’s for about long enough to eat lunch — I transferred after a semester, after being cut from the basketball team — my love for the place is immeasurable.

Both HBCUs have legacies and futures that deserve preserving, but both also face a daunting reality: small, private schools around the country are shuttering their doors faster than one can say “boola boola.”

In a recent letter to St. Aug’s alumni, board of trustees chair Brian Boulware wrote that several Triangle business titans demanded during a February dinner that the schools merge because they covet that business-fertile acreage upon which Shaw sits. Boulware later identified them as a television station owner, a former local newspaper exec and a prominent local developer.

After reading that letter, alumni were justifiably incensed. I was ready to join them in storming the Bastille — figuratively: it’s too hot right now to be storming anything — and resist any merger.

But then I spoke separately to two people who attended the dinner at which the schools were purportedly ordered to merge for the benefit of downtown business interests. Both denied that any such orders were given, while acknowledging that they offered to hire a consultant to study ways the schools could work together, including a possible merger.

Proud alumni, I get it: You fear losing your schools’ legacies if they merge. But we will probably lose the schools if they don’t.

While neither school should stand for being bullied into merging, nothing that increases their chances of survival should be off the table — and merging looks like the best option.

And what a great time for it! Each day’s newspaper seems to have a fresh story about diversity, equity and inclusion programs at predominantly white institutions being dismantled by conservatives.

Despair not, for there’s encouraging news. A recent $1 billion donation to Johns Hopkins University that will make tuition free for nearly all of its medical school students is a blueprint for how Shaw and St. Aug’s can thrive. Even my untrained eye can see that Shaw’s property is worth many millions. Were Shaw to sell from its current position of strength, the schools could give birth to a super-HBCU, and St. Shawgustine’s leaders wouldn’t have to go hat-in-hand seeking help.

There’s a business maxim that money attracts money, and with those many millions, the new, merged entity could attract more money. It could then attract the best professors and best students, while sending forth into the world generations of learned graduates who contribute to society. They could also tell those other schools what they can do with their DEI programs.

Legacy? There — more than any building or verdant land — is your legacy.

This story was originally published July 17, 2024 at 6:00 AM.