Someday I want to visit Berea College in Berea, KY, in southern Appalachia. I had never heard of it until my own child was looking at schools. It was not the right college for him, but it embodies many of the ideals I admire most.
Its motto: God has made of one blood all peoples of the earth.
Berea was founded by Christian abolitionists in 1855. It was the first interracial and the first coed college in the American south. When the Kentucky legislature passed a bill banning integrated colleges in 1904, Berea challenged the law up to the U.S. Supreme Court, losing finally in 1908. Meanwhile, it established a separate institution for black students. Berea was re-integrated in 1950, the year the Kentucky legislature amended the 1904 legislation.
Berea's enrollment today is 1,615. Its undergraduate teaching is ranked 11th in the country by U.S. News & World Report, which rates Berea as the 76th liberal arts college overall.
Berea's enrollment is mostly regional, with about a third of students from other parts of the U.S. or other countries. About a third are minority students. More than half ranked in the top fifth of their high school classes.
What distinguishes Berea today is that it enrolls ONLY students with financial need.
Some statistics:
-- All students come from families whose income is less than 40 percent of the U.S. average.
The average family income of admitted students is less than $27,000.
-- Fifty-three percent of students come from families in which neither parent has a college
degree.
-- All students receive free tuition. All attend full-time, and all work at least 10 hours a week.
-- Freshman-sophomore retention is 82 percent overall, 85 percent among African American
students, a rate many public colleges would be proud to report.
-- Costs to students are less than $5,000 a year. Graduates' debt averages $7,224.
Berea's endowment is more than $1 billion, but it could always use more. I believe our country would be much improved if we had 100 Berea-style colleges.
Ditto
ReplyDelete