Saving our beloved Bennett College

In 2018 Bennett College a small HBCU is up for accreditation review. These universities faced financial hardship due to low enrollment and high student turn-overs.

Small HBCU such as these is often private schools who received the majority of their school funding through non-profits, churches, and donations from various organizations. Due to their campus size, these schools are only allowed to hold a certain number of students. If they don’t meet their yearly goal of enrollment, then they will face financial cut. Based on an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, they break down why HBCU face financial hardship.

“Most HBCUs have never had large budgets, and the problem has become worse for many. In recent years:

States have cut funding to three out of four public HBCUs since the recession. Louisiana’s funding to Grambling State University, for example, was cut in half in a recent eight-year stretch.

The Obama administration tightened credit requirements on federal student loans in 2012. Suddenly, applicants for so-called PLUS loans were turned down by the thousands, taking a deep attract money from major foundations or donors. Bill and Camille Cosby’s $25 million gifts to Spelman in 1988 is believed to be the largest donation to an HBCU. “That was 30 years ago,” Dillard University president Walter Kimbrough said. “That’s ridiculous.”

In December 2018 Bennett College received a noticed that they must raise $5 Million dollars by the first of February to secure their accreditation. The question that most readers and alumni have is Will Bennett be able to be raised that about of money in 45 days?

Their goal to reach this amount of money in such a short period of time is to reach out to donors, Foundations, Corporations, and other organizations, both nationally and locally. They even created a GivingTuesday account entitled # SavingBennett.

“College leaders said they had been improving this year in key metrics like enrollment, retention and student loan default rates. And the college had already been touting recent philanthropic successes, like steadily increasing fund-raising totals.”

Bennett is located in Greensboro, North Carolina where they are surrounded by numerous institutions that offer a wide variety of programs and Bennett has struggled.

Dating back to 2011 its documented that Bennett has had a financial issue which caused them to be placed on probation for Financial Stability.

Let’s pray this historically black college isn’t forced to close their doors this coming fall.

The infographic below is an overview of the national average enrollment rates, classroom sizes, scholars and donations that are provided to HBCU’s a year.

#bennettcollege #hbcusmatter