Dr. Walter M. KimbroughI am finishing my year as the interim president of Talladega College. As reported, the College has experienced some difficult times, and I arrived last June to try to help begin resolving the issues. We’ve made progress, but as I told our alumni recently, we’ve moved from life support to intensive care, but it is possible to go back on life support without significant support. We have a long road to recovery, but I am excited that Dr. Willie Todd, Jr., has accepted the challenge. He’s an HBCU grad and worked at several HBCUs in a senior capacity, including president. He gets it.
I do too.
Last summer when I got the call from the board chair, I asked my wife (she’s a Talladega alumna). She said, “That’s my school” and kicked me out of the house! Okay, not really, but in short order I was here. Knowing our challenges, I worked for the first five weeks for free, personally paid for all my college-related travel this year and then donated over $15,000 this year. I’ve been all in, all year long.
Having served as president of two HBCUs for almost 18 years, a vice president for five, former chair of the UNCF member presidents, and member of the White House HBCU Advisory Board appointed by President Biden, I knew I could use my knowledge and relationships to help begin to address our issues. We didn’t fix everything this year, but there were several existential threats that we were able to avoid, and I am grateful for the entire team here, and my colleagues and friends that supported us this year.
I want HBCUs to win, especially now when there is an assault on everything (and everyone) Black. But over the past few years I have noticed a pattern that troubles me. The presidential search process has become hyper-politicized, and we’re now watching the fruits of this plot to destroy HBCUs. It’s being done through the presidential search process.
Nowhere has this been more painfully evident than the search for the next president of Florida A&M University. I was not a candidate, so this isn’t a sour grapes argument. I know two of the finalists, and I am confident that either of them would be a great choice. But I, like many, raised eyebrows at the candidate who reportedly was a late addition finalist.
On paper, she had no business being a finalist. Period. As the nation’s political leaders loudly preach merit, this candidate would clearly be labeled by them as a DEI hire if she was a finalist at a predominantly White institution. But there has been no such challenge to someone with no higher education experience.
I listened to her interview with the board. She was asked to name the peers of FAMU, with specific interest in salary comparisons. Someone who knows higher education would have said just last week The Chronicle of Higher Education published the article, “Who Does Your College Think Its Peers Are?”
Based on data each school submitted through IPEDS, one would have known that FAMU listed five peers, 16 institutions listed FAMU as a peer, and only one listed FAMU that FAMU also listed, North Carolina A&T. Interestingly, FAMU listed no Florida state schools, and none listed FAMU.
If she did her homework, she would have seen the faculty salary benchmarking study the trustees mentioned. In fact, the Segal group study, easily found on the website, indicates they used a CUPA-HR custom peer group of 56 schools. There are several metrics that one could use to identify peers or aspirational peers. But what we got was three minutes of rambling with no ability to demonstrate she understood the issue.
The plot to destroy HBCUs was on full display. In states where ideologically conservative boards reign, they are pushing candidates wholly unqualified to lead. The question will be if they will ignore the massive resistance to this candidate and hire her or realize that making her the president is an open declaration of war on FAMU. Recently, the alumni at Albany State University mounted a campaign against a rumored potential candidate, and the University System of Georgia did not select him.
But those wanting to destroy HBCUs have other tactics. Many presidential searches are confidential, with the thought that a strong candidate, like a sitting president, would not apply if their interest became public, because if they aren’t selected the relationship with their current campus might be strained, or even destroyed. Having been a president, I fully understand this concern.
But the downside is the public doesn’t know what the pool looks like, and so they are unaware of the shenanigans that have taken place. Several times in the past few years, I’ve had colleagues ask me why I wasn’t in a search, and when I tell them I was, they’re shocked. When you see people selected with little to no higher ed experience, no senior higher education experience, or no HBCU experience, you quickly realize there is a deliberate effort to undermine these institutions.
The activism by the alums at both Albany State and FAMU must be the norm going forward. What happened at FAMU to allow a completely unqualified candidate to sit as a finalist must never happen again. As Dr. Martin Luther King reminded us, “A time comes when silence is betrayal.” If we love HBCUs, we can’t continue this betrayal.
The plot to destroy HBCUs is no longer a secret. We’re watching it online.
Dr. Walter M. Kimbrough is the Interim President of Talladega College and has served as president of Dillard University and Philander Smith University.
