Mississippi HBCU merger dies in Legislature

The most controversial part of Governor Haley Barbour’s legislative agenda – the merging of universities – died a quiet and not unexpected death Tuesday.

The proposal was not taken up in committee in either chamber of the Legislature. Tuesday was the deadline for bills to be passed out of committee in the chamber where they originated.

Normally it is not safe to say an issue is dead for the session because of various methods of getting around the committee process, such as amending legislation on the floor of either chamber.

But both the House and Senate Universities and Colleges committees chairs said Tuesday they do not see a mechanism to revive the merger proposal during the 2010 session.

In November, to deal with the state’s budget crunch, Barbour had proposed merging Mississippi University for Women in Columbus with nearby Mississippi State University and placing the three historically black universities – Mississippi Valley State University, Alcorn State University and Jackson State University – all under the JSU umbrella.

In the House, Universities and College Committee Chair Kelvin Buck, D-Holly Springs, said early on he would not consider legislation to merge universities.

On Tuesday, his Senate counterpart, Doug Davis, R-Hernando, said he did not bring up the legislation in his committee because “as of right now at this time, I don’t think the votes are there to pass it.”

The other most notable proposal Barbour made in November called for consolidation of 152 school districts into 100. But the governor has formed a commission to study the issue and to make a recommendation in early April.

JSU Prez stands by his HBCU merger plan

Despite a public backlash, Jackson State President Ronald Mason Jr. has reiterated his stance in favor of merging Mississippi's three historically black universities.

"I know the challenges we face today - we could stop the merger and still end up losing the schools," he told a group of about 300 students who gathered on campus Wednesday. "If not this, then what?"

Mason, speaking by phone from Washington, received several "boos" from students as he explained his idea to consolidate Alcorn State, Jackson State and Mississippi Valley State into a new "Jacobs State University."

"This really would be a model for the next generation of HBCUs," he said. "I've thought about this a lot."

Mason, who has led JSU since 2000, has been recognized nationally as one of the top HBCU leaders. In 2008, he received the Thurgood Marshall College Fund's Education Leadership Award - the highest individual honor given to a current leader of a public HBCU.

He publicly opposed a similar merger proposal made by Gov. Haley Barbour in November.

But in a 34-page presentation obtained by The Clarion-Ledger recently, Mason suggests creating a single university would be better than letting "financially weak ASU, MVSU, JSU become weaker" in the state's budget crisis.

The university system is preparing to lose more than $180 million in appropriations by 2012 because of the budget crisis and the end of federal stimulus dollars.

"In my mind, if we don't come together, we could end up dying apart," Mason said.

Mason said his idea was not ready to be made public. He had discussed it with selected state leaders and alumni. "I've just been picking people's brains," he said.

But lawmakers Wednesday condemned Mason for making the suggestion.

"Whether it be President Mason or Gov. Barbour, we think it shows a clear lack of wisdom," said House Universities and Colleges Committee Chairman Kelvin Buck, D-Holly Springs. "It is a position that we cannot support and will not support."

Sen. David Jordan, D-Greenwood, said he felt betrayed by Mason's decision to suggest a merger behind closed doors.

"We have a Philistine among us," said Jordan, a Valley State grad. "The only thing (Mason) needs to close is his mouth."

Other alumni expressed a similar disapproval.

"Alcorn State and Valley State will merge with Jackson State the day after Mississippi State and (the University of Southern Mississippi) merge with Ole Miss," Alcorn alum Matt Thomas said.

Rep. Billy Broomfield, D-Moss Point, said he received an e-mail with the PowerPoint presentation last week.

"He (Mason) didn't realize how ludicrous it was," said Broomfield, who chairs the Legislative Black Caucus.

Despite two Senate bills that propose mergers, Bounds said the merger idea is a nonissue. The bills have not been taken up.

"The House has made it abundantly clear that they will not take this up," he said. "The most productive thing we can do now is find out how we deal with the cuts we face."

Alcorn State President George Ross said Wednesday he does not believe the university's future is at stake.

"We're having to make some tough choices that we maybe would not have made otherwise," he said.

Jackson State University President Ronald Mason's suggestion to create a single university out of the state's three historically black colleges includes the proposal to rename the school Jacobs State University.

The proposed name would honor H.P. Jacobs, who is one of the founding fathers of JSU.

A former slave, Jacobs went on to become a minister and doctor who founded the Mississippi Baptist Convention and Natchez Seminary, which eventually would become Jackson State.

"I just thought he was a great symbol of black people being able to overcome," Mason said.

His PowerPoint presentation on the merger notes that Alcorn State and JSU are both named after "slave owner/segregationists."

MS Gov. proposes to merge state's three HBCUs

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour has proposed combining the state's three public black colleges into a single institution, Jackson State University. While Barbour said that campuses would continue to exist at what are now Alcorn State University and Mississippi Valley State University, the proposal marks the most dramatic state challenge in recent years to the continuation of some public black colleges -- and the move comes in the state whose higher education system was the subject of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that governs college desegregation.

Barbour stressed that the merged institutions would survive in some form, he also said that this reorganization should result in the elimination of many programs, which supporters of black colleges fear will come largely from their institutions. The governor's budget statement said that all of the state's public colleges would see "a rationalization of class offerings.... Every university would be expected to reduce costs by consolidating or eliminating programs not pulling their financial weight." (The plan in total would turn eight universities in the state system into five.)


"I think this would be another act of discriminating against black colleges," said Julius L. Chambers, a leading civil rights lawyer who is president emeritus of a historically black institution, North Carolina Central University.

Chambers noted that mergers of black educational institutions in the South have not historically gone well for black students and educators. "What happens to the faculty at black colleges" when programs are consolidated? he asked. And if the consolidations result in smaller branch campuses where Alcorn State and Mississippi Valley are now full institutions, "how do you ensure that the same number of minority students end up in college? Why aren't they asking questions about minority enrollments?"

Not only is the governor making the proposal, but some powerful legislators have also been talking up the merger idea, not restricting it to black colleges (although other lawmakers are likely to oppose any mergers). Many advocates for black colleges fear that shortages in state budgets could lead to an increase in such proposals.

Any merger of black colleges in Mississippi would have particular political significance because of United States v. Fordice, a 1992 Supreme Court decision that found Mississippi had failed to desegregate its higher education system. The decision specifically encouraged the state to consider mergers and to cut down on duplication of academic programs as a means of desegregating -- but the decision did not order mergers.

The theory behind these suggestions is that duplication of academic programs at historically black and predominantly white institutions encourages white students to enroll at one set of institutions and black students at another -- and that the elimination of these choices will lead to a situation where black and white students enroll at the same institutions.

But supporters of black colleges have another theory about mergers: that they have consistently resulted in the elimination of options at institutions with a history of serving black students. Justice Clarence Thomas, while concurring with the Fordice decision, warned in a separate opinion that there was a danger of interpreting the ruling in ways that could hurt black colleges.

Writing that "I think it undisputable that these institutions have succeeded in part because of their distinctive histories and traditions," he argued that states should not assume that the path to desegregation would be found with fewer historically black institutions. "It would be ironic, to say the least, if the institutions that sustained blacks during segregation were themselves destroyed in an effort to combat its vestiges," he wrote.

Mississippi eventually settled the case not with mergers, but with a pledge to spend much more money on improving programs at black colleges so that they would be better able to serve all students. But not all of the promises made in that settlement have been carried out. Just this month, The Clarion-Ledger of Jackson, Miss., reported on how the state's pledge to create a $35 million private endowment to support black colleges never gained more than the initial $1 million that was used to start the endowment seven years ago, and that many in the state assume the promised funds will never be provided.

In light of the state's pledge to desegregate by building up black colleges, it's "truly shocking" that the governor would propose merging the three black institutions into one, said Marybeth Gasman, an associate professor of education at the University of Pennsylvania who has written extensively on the history of black colleges.

"I don't think you can take the Fordice settlement out of the equation," she said. "They settled the case by saying that they were going to bolster the HBCUs. They didn't provide the money and now they are going to merge them?.... This is money that has been long, long owed to black colleges, and now they are going to take so much away from them."

Because black colleges never got all the money they were owed, Gasman said, they will be at a disadvantage in programs reviews of duplicative programs. "This raises all kinds of suspicions in light of the state's history with its black colleges," she said.

Further, she questioned the idea that it makes educational sense to merge Alcorn and Mississippi Valley into Jackson State. While they are all historically black, she noted that they aren't right next door to one another (Alcorn is 80 miles southwest of Jackson and Valley is 100 miles north of Jackson) and they differ in campus environment, with Jackson State focused on an urban mission and the other two located in rural areas.

"These institutions are very different, and they are 80 or more miles apart," Gasman said. "Why are they being asked to consolidate? One can assume that they are similar because they are historically black, but that neglects the diversity of these institutions."