Modesto City Schools OKs plan to send students on tour of historically Black colleges
In its first meeting of February, which is Black History Month, the Modesto City Schools board approved a plan to send 30 students on a five-day tour of historically Black colleges and universities next month.
The HBCU tour is set for March 20-24 and will visit seven schools: Spelman College, Morehouse College, Clark Atlanta University and Morris Brown College, all in Atlanta; and Tuskegee University in Tuskegee, Ala., Talladega College in Talladega, Ala., and Alabama State University in Montgomery.
The tour is free to the students. The total cost to send the 30 youth and four chaperons is $72,250, which will be paid for through Title IV funding.
The district is partnering with Stepping in the Right Direction for the tour. That organization will provide a predeparture orientation, ground transportation, hotel accommodations, guided campus tours, cultural excursions including a visit to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. museum in Atlanta, and HBCU Tour backpacks and T-shirts.
This is the first time in about four years the district is offering an HBCU tour, MCS public information officer Linda Mumma Solorio told The Bee in an email.
The district primarily is getting the word out through its high schools’ Black student unions, whose students “have already shown interest and participation in a leadership development role; as well as an interest in attending a 4-year institution after graduating high school,” she said.
But looking to future years, the tour is open to all students, district equity and intervention specialist Fallon Ferris told trustees. HBCUs are working to diversify their student populations, Ferris noted, so there are a lot of scholarship opportunities for Caucasian and Latino students.
In her presentation to trustees, Ferris made these points about HBCUs:
- Over half of all Black professionals in the U.S. are graduates of HBCUs.
- More than 50% of the nation’s Black public-school teachers and 70% of Black dentists and physicians earned degrees at HBCUs.
- In 2004, the publication Black Issues in Higher Education reported that eight of the top nine producers of Black baccalaureates in mathematics and statistics were HBCUs.
- And nine out of 10 colleges that have Black graduates who go on to pursue a doctorate are HBCU graduates.
Four MCS chaperons will accompany the students. Two of them will be Ferris and Trustee John Erin III. Because he will be on the trip, the latter recused himself from the otherwise unanimous board vote to approve the tour. For the other two spots, Ferris said, the district is looking at former and current Black student union advisers.
She also told trustees, “Because we know this experience can be incredibly impactful for students, we want to ensure we are identifying funding sources to enable our district to provide this opportunity on an ongoing basis. The Raymus Foundation is currently accepting applications for such an opportunity as this. We’re working with internal grant writers to ensure funding is requested for upcoming years.”
The Manteca-based Antone and Marie Raymus Foundation awards grants in San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties and focuses on education, healthcare and cultural enrichment.
Mumma Solorio said Modesto City Schools looks forward “to reinstituting the tour this year and exploring the possibility of expanding the opportunity in future years, based on the level of interest. Right now, BSU advisors and sites are working expeditiously to identify students interested and willing to attend the tour this year.”
Currently, there are no GPA requirements to be accepted for the tour, she said.
