Black Excellence is everywhere, but, according to Ashley Christopher, Esq. it starts at HBCU Week.
Christopher, President, CEO and Founder of HBCU Week, set out in 2017 with a mission: encourage high-school-aged youth to enroll in Historically Black Colleges and Universities, provide scholarship dollars for matriculation and sustain a pipeline for employment from undergraduate school to corporate America, all while minimizing student debt. For five years straight, the double HBCU alumna, has done just that.
HBCU Week Foundation, Inc. hosted its fifth annual HBCU Week Awards Gala presented by Bank of America on June 28 at the Hotel Dupont in Wilmington, Delaware. While the Awards Gala is the most glamorous of the week-long programmatic initiative, the HBCU Week College Fair is most impactful. Separating itself from other college fairs, a majority of the participating colleges engage in a “on the spot” acceptance process. Students that attend the fair with a copy for their transcript and a report with the requisite SAT/ACT score, could be admitted into college and offered a scholarship, on the spot. Since its inception, more than 8,000 on the spot acceptances had been offered.
The 2023 HBCU Week College Fair results are as followed: 2,366 on the spot acceptances, 1,336 scholarships offered, 967 partial scholarships offered, 369 full-rides offered, and over $22 million in scholarships offered.
There are many ways the collective community can support HBCU Week Foundation, but Christopher mentioned a capacity oversight she’d like to see addressed.
“HBCUs are only 3% of colleges and universities nationwide. Last year, Howard University received a record number of 40,000 applicants,” she told ESSENCE. “It would be nice for the younger generation to advocate for that space to be expanded. There is a high demand, but the supply is…
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