Throughout this election year, both candidates spoke about all they’d done to support the nation’s historically Black colleges and universities.

I spent this week in New Orleans with presidents, administrators and faculty from 60 HBCUs in 20 states. We convened for a conference hosted by the Lumina Foundation, pegged as an opportunity for this group to meet and learn from each other about how to advance these institutions. 

It’s a meeting I looked forward to, because it meant I’d be hearing directly from HBCU leaders, researchers and policy experts as we head into a new administration and a new calendar year, with legislatures set to return to session and dole out (or not) funding and decrees for these institutions.

Through hours of conversations, panel discussions and general chit chat, I learned this group was curious, hopeful, and maybe a bit concerned about what’s to come. Here are some themes I took away from the event:

Despite attacks in recent years on DEI, critical race theory and the very notion of diversity, another Trump administration doesn’t automatically bode poorly for HBCUs.

In multiple sessions, the subject came up of what to make of another Donald Trump presidency. Some pointed to the evidence they had to work with: the previous four years with him were a mixed bag for HBCUs. Trump has boasted that during his first term, he “got them all funded.” That's not true, though he did sign laws that made millions of dollars available for these schools through the FUTURE Act. 

Is it a bad time to work in DEI in public education? Probably. But that doesn’t mean HBCUs will be targeted, many said. 

“It is something that we have to be very clear about — how we define the institution,” said Denise A. Smith, deputy director of higher education policy and senior fellow at the Century Foundation.

This is important, she said, to ensure politicians don’t conflate HBCUs and their historic mission with the perception of DEI and divisive political concepts.

Be willing to work with both sides of the aisle.

I intentionally didn’t say “across,” because technically, public university presidents usually don’t want to disclose their political beliefs and risk losing funding, their jobs, or some other sort of retribution from the state. But many spoke about the power of leveraging their school’s community. 

“You need your alums because they can do what you can't do, especially if you’re at a public university,” said Stephanie Hall, chief government and legislative affairs officer at Coppin State University.

Hall cited an example in Mississippi, where earlier this year a bill was introduced and caused an uproar. It aimed to close three public universities and caused great alarm that the state’s HBCUs were in danger. The bill died after more than 14,000 people, many publicly identifying themselves as alumni of Mississippi HBCUs, signed an online petition calling for the legislation’s demise, Molly Minta wrote for Mississippi Today.

Many attendees spoke about the potential in coalition building, and working as a collective to more effectively secure funding and support.

For this group, it’s not news their schools are woefully underfunded — last summer the federal government issued a report that in 16 states, these HBCU land-grant institutions have collectively been underfunded by more than $12 billion. A common refrain this week: Without intention and strategy, a windfall of cash won’t appear.

One example: The NC10, a “collaborative community” of the state’s 10 accredited HBCUs (five private, five public) created to provide support, training and leverage that might not exist otherwise.

Launched by the Center for Racial Equity in Education (CREED), Executive Director James Ford said the initiative launched to create a collaborative that could operate across lines of shared interests and tackle shared challenges. After listening sessions and focus groups with the schools’ communities, NC10 published strategic goals and legislative recommendations. The group now also works with allies in the state Legislature.

“Before you get to engaging your legislators in a meaningful way … you have to have something like this that is leading the way, listening and doing all this hard work,” said Rep. Zack Hawkins, a North Carolina Democrat who co-chairs the state’s HBCU Caucus.

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Elsewhere on Open Campus

In a collaboration with The Hechinger Report and our partner newsrooms Mississippi Today, Signal Cleveland and WUNC, reporters wrote about how rural-serving universities are shedding degree programs. 

In Texas: Sneha Dey profiled the only community college class in the state that helps prepare incarcerated Texans for life after prison.

In Florida: For the Tampa Bay Times, Ian Hodgson dug into how the state offers a glimpse at what a conservative vision for higher education might mean for the nation’s colleges and universities under a Trump administration.

In Colorado: Public university leaders told Jason Gonzales they’re better prepared now to support the immigrant students on their campuses than they were during President-elect Donald Trump’s first term.

In North Carolina: As freshman enrollment declines nationally, North Carolina’s public university system enrollment has increased yet again, Brianna Atkinson writes.

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