When Anthony Davis became president of Livingstone College in October 2022, the historically Black school in Salisbury, North Carolina, had a freshman class of 220 students. Back then, it was common for only half of Livingstone’s freshmen to return the next academic year. Davis planned to disrupt that trend.
By connecting students with academic support centers and engaging them before they could consider leaving,the new president and his team raised the retention rate at the private HBCU from 50 percent to 78 percent. The freshman head count climbed the following year as Livingstone expanded its recruitment, and it soared to 441 this fall — at a time when fewer high school graduates are heading to college.
“Our strategy is working,” Davis said. “We’ve been looking at how we recruit and retain students, being very intentional and we’ve seen great results.”
Enrollment at historically Black colleges and universities is recovering from the pandemic at a faster rate than much of the rest of higher education. Some HBCUs have reported as much as a 30 percent growth in this year’s freshman class compared with prior years.The end of race-conscious admissions, record philanthropic gifts and the rise of HBCU graduate Vice President Kamala Harris has placed an enduring spotlight on the sector.
While HBCU leaders say those factors may have helped raise the profile of their schools, they mostly attribute the gains in head count to years of strategic planning paying off. The schools are seizing a moment of goodwill and attracting students who value being in an environment where they feel more comfortable and canpursue a rigorous education.
“Every professor I’ve met here cares about whether I’m succeeding,” said Christian Gibbs, 18, a freshman at Livingstone studying business administration. “Maybe it’s partly because they look like me and can see themselves in me.”
With a 4.5 GPA in high school, Gibbs had his pick of colleges. The Atlanta native was accepted at 15 schools, including Emory University in his home state. He wanted a college where he could continue to run track but not need a sports scholarship to cover the costs. He also wanted a schoolthat would feel like an extension of home, a place that would nurture him without judgment.
Gibbs had never even heard of Livingstone when the college reached out to him through the recruiting platform Next College Student Athlete. An offer of a full ride piqued his interest, and a campus visit sealed the deal.
“I had done other campus visits, but Livingstone just felt like family,” Gibbs said. “I’ve been to all types of schools, but never a predominantly Black school. College is a time of self-growth and self-development, and I needed to be around people like me to thrive.”
Because of students like Gibbs, enrollment gains at HBCUs are evident at small and large institutions, urban and rural, public and private. Some schools are courting older students with robust online programs or expanding their reach to recruit more students from across the country, said Nadrea R. Njoku, assistant vice president of the Frederick D. Patterson Research Institute at the United Negro College Fund.
“All of our HBCUs are thinking critically about their business models and how they create different streams of revenue and target different populations,” Njoku said. “The changes you’re seeing are happening at other types of institutions, but you cannot deny how opportunity meets preparation with our schools. They are in the public eye and taking the opportunity to tell their story.”
Both Alabama A&M University and Howard University welcomed their largest incoming class this fall, while Elizabeth City State University recorded a 23 percent increase in freshmen and Benedict College’s first-time student count was up 31.4 percent. Meanwhile, total enrollment is up more than 3 percent at North Carolina A&T State University, Fisk University, Prairie View A&M University and Kentucky State University.
According to data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, as of last year HBCUs are down about 7,000 students compared with 2019, while higher education broadly is down 900,000 students. Historically Black institutions recorded enrollment growth in fall 2021 and fall 2022, despite many students opting out of higher education. The Clearinghouse reported a decline in HBCU enrollment in fall 2023, but researchers noted that fewer Black schools had submitted their number in time for the final report. Early reporting from individual schools and the Clearinghouse suggests another year of growth.
In the last two years, the University of the District of Columbia has witnessed total enrollment grow 11.5 percent in 2023 and another 9 percent this fall. It now counts 4,202 students in its undergraduate and graduate programs. UDC President Maurice Edington said coming out of the pandemic, the public HBCU has been more aggressive in developing relationships with area high schools.
The university is also benefiting from a partnership with the District’s Advanced Technical Center, where students can take high school and college-level courses through UDC and Trinity Washington University. Edington said the career prep program has increased familiarity with the university and fostered relationships with students who want to continue their studies at UDC.
UDC freshman Jairus Kelly, 19, had his heart set for years on playing lacrosse at Duke University in his home state of North Carolina. Yet he wrestled with whether to enroll after being accepted into the prestigious school. Kelly said he had spent enough years of his academic life being the only Black student in class and being picked on because of it. He wanted a different experience in college.
“I have the rest of my life to be a minority. Why not enjoy my college career in a place where I’m not?” said Kelly, a business management major who wants to be a sports agent.
Kelly said UDC gave him a close-knit community, an opportunity to continue playing lacrosse and a place to thrive. He has secured an internship with a sports media agency for the summer. “Everybody is so helpful here, everybody is looking out for each other, everybody cares,” he said. “This is a good fit.”
Opinions are mixed on whether the Supreme Court decision ending race-conscious admissions is a driving factor behind enrollment growth at some historically Black colleges.
Applications did increase nearly 30 percent this year for the 39 historically Black schools that participate in the Common App, an online portal for students to submit one application to multiple colleges. A surge in submissions at Howard University, Morehouse College and North Carolina A&T could certainly be tied to the court’s ruling, higher education experts say.
But those schools have reported steady growth for several years. Indeed, the Common Black College Application, which is only used for HBCUs, has tracked nearly 13 percent annual growth in the last five years.
“The Supreme Court decision has given HBCUs an opportunity to really tell our story and highlight ourselves as an institution of choice,” said Yohannis A. Job, vice president for enrollment management at Benedict College in Columbia, South Carolina. “It has allowed young people to ask the question: Is this the place where I will be celebrated … where my identity will not just be a diversity checkbox?”
Students are witnessing colleges dial back diversity, equity and inclusion policies amid pressure from conservative politicians, leaving students to question whether they are welcomed on some campuses, said Felecia Commodore, associate professor of education policy at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. These are the same students who saw the nation erupt in protests after George Floyd’s murder in 2020 and saw parents grow more fearful about their safety.
“Because of the nurturing and the care you get at an HBCU, a lot of families were looking at these schools, but George Floyd pushed some over the edge,” said Hasanna Tyus, vice president of enrollment management at UDC. “As a mother with high-school-aged children, I’m looking for ‘Will my child be safe?’ and ‘Where’s the most value?’”
Fisk University President Agenia Walker Clark said that she wouldn’t negate the Supreme Court decision having some impacton enrollment trends, but that alumni experiences and successes remain the most salient selling points for her institution.
“The stories our alumni share are recruiting tools that get students interested in learning more about us,” Clark said. “And when they do, they see the value of our education.”
Sky Jones, 18, a freshman at Fisk who wants to become an obstetrician, said the university in Nashville became a top pick after she learned that it had a highly rated biology program and a direct pipeline to Meharry Medical College. With the right grades and test scores, she could fast-track admissions to the historically Black medical school through a partnership Fisk and Meharry kicked off in 2020.
“This is what I was looking for — these kind of connections, the kind that help you get ahead,” said Jones, who is from Atlanta.
While Fisk and other historically Black schools are thrilled to welcome more students to campus, they are cautious about overextending their resources. Fisk must be mindful of the limitations of space to expand in an urban setting, so future growth has to include updating existing buildings and being strategic in building new ones, Clark said.
Danielle Douglas-Gabriel covers the economics of higher education, writing about the financial policies that determine a student’s access to education and ability to complete a credential. follow on X @DaniDougPost
