Cameron Mells was in a rush. The 19-year-old Morgan State engineering student had to grab breakfast, eat, and get to class on time.
Mells walked into the University Student Center, a 142,000 square-foot building completed in 2020 and now a hub of activity on a campus swelling with students — almost all of whom are Black.
The environment is part of what has in recent years attracted tens of thousands more students like Mells to historically Black colleges and universities, or HBCUs.
“I wanted to attend a place where I could be around people I could identify with and feel supported and safe,” he said.
Across Morgan State’s skyline, cranes are busy at work. The sound of beeping dump trucks fills the air. The university has been on a building spree in the last decade, with more than $600 million in capital projects that have either been completed or the college has committed to construct.
The new student center sits across from the football field, which, in 2019, got a $2.5-million makeover. There are new dorms and a new health- and human-services center. Plans have been finalized for a $342-million STEM facility that’s set to open in three years.
These investments come as Morgan State has experienced unprecedented growth. In the last seven years, enrollment increased 45 percent, from 6,419 undergraduate students in 2018 to 9,319 in 2024.
Overall HBCU enrollment is up almost 6 percent this fall compared to 2023, according to National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. It’s the third consecutive year that enrollment at HBCUs has increased. That’s despite overall enrollment declines across higher ed, especially for Black students and at colleges with high concentrations of Pell Grant recipients.
Experts point to rebranding efforts, innovations in recruitment and retention, and strategic investments in new programs and facilities — paid for with record-breaking philanthropic donations and federal investments — as explanations for the trend.
Though HBCUs were once largely regarded as providers of sub-par educations, now, celebrities such as ESPN host Shannon Sharpe, a graduate of Savannah State University, and Vice President Kamala Harris, a graduate of Howard University, regularly tout nostalgia for their alma maters.
“If these schools are educating the best and brightest who then climb the socioeconomic ladder, then they become more attractive to students,” said Robert Mason, founder of Common Black College Application, which helps connect HBCUs and college-bound high-school students.
A series of high-profile racist incidents at majority-white institutions, the Supreme Court’s decision regarding race-conscious admissions efforts, and the banning of diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in several states have also bolstered the attractiveness of HBCUs.
Some institutions’ brands are as strong as ever. Clark Atlanta University, for example, received more than 45,000 applications this past spring, more than the University of Georgia.
But such rapid growth isn’t shared across the 99 federally designated HBCUs.
Take, for example, North Carolina, home to 10 Black colleges. Over the last decade, enrollment declined at eight of them, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Shaw University, in Raleigh, saw its student population decrease by almost half.
Saint Augustine’s University, also in Raleigh, is tens of millions of dollars in debt and on the brink of losing its accreditation. Last spring, the college was temporarily unable to make payroll.
“When you have a conversation with most people about HBCUs and ask them to name these institutions, they typically name the same handful of schools,” Mason said.
Smaller and lower-profile Black colleges too often remain “unseen” and in the shadows, Mason added.
Total enrollment at HBCUs slid 11.6 percent from 2010 to 2022, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Though it’s on the rise again, it has yet to rebound to its 2010 peak of 327,000 students.
The outsized growth in recent years at several HBCUs has presented administrators with a new challenge: How to grow at a pace that adequately serves a historically disenfranchised group of students? Meanwhile, admissions officers have been forced to become more selective, a break in tradition for many HBCUs that were founded to educate formerly enslaved people and have made accessibility explicit in their mission.
“HBCUs are having an identity crisis,” said James Burrell, executive director of admissions at Wilberforce University. “The enrollment boom is forcing them to consider who they are and who they serve.”
A Focus on Retention Results in Record-Breaking Growth
A little more than a decade ago, fewer than 40 percent of North Carolina A&T State University’s students graduated within six years.
Administrators at the time launched an academic-support system that assesses subject areas in which a student might need help.
Today, class sizes are regularly analyzed to determine how many students can fill a section without damaging the quality of instruction, said Joseph Montgomery, the college’s associate vice provost for enrollment management.
Students’ schedules are audited to make sure they are not bundling classes that would overload them with too much work.
While the college can’t force a student to drop a class, it can offer the suggestion. And if the student doesn’t drop the course, administrators send text alerts and emails about available tutoring services.
With more than 14,000 students, North Carolina A&T has experienced more than an 11-percent increase in enrollment. It has continued to hold its position as the largest HBCU in the country.
And now, 56 percent of its students graduate within six years, according to university data.
This increase in retention rate has transformed North Carolina A&T — both in the number of students who remain on campus each year and in its reputation among HBCUs and with Black families, according to Montgomery.
“Our retention and completion rates have gone up, and to so many Black families who are familiar with HBCUs, this isn’t the experience they remember 30 years ago,” Montgomery said.
That has translated into increased interest in applying to the college. Last year, North Carolina A&T received 45,000 applications, more than double the amount it received in 2018, Montgomery said.
It’s hard to gain admission to the college’s more popular majors, such as kinesiology and engineering.
“Often it comes down to not admitting students who plan to take up certain majors so we don’t sacrifice the quality of the program,” Montgomery said.
Once positioned as institutions where access trumped selectivity, HBCUs now face increased demand and limited supply. That means more students will be rejected.
North Carolina A&T is now the third most selective public college in the state, trailing only North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, according to Montgomery.
Traditions Old and New
In order to improve their college’s brand, some HBCUs have mixed new offerings with old traditions.
Wilberforce, which has been in an entrenched battle to remain accredited, recently added bachelor’s programs in biochemistry, mathematical science, engineering, aviation, and kinesiology.
The college also invested in customer-relations-management software to schedule emails to prospective students, and Burrell combs the Common Black College Application database to recruit students.
Administrators a few years ago re-established its marching band, a tradition strongly tied to the Black college experience. Decked out in green tracksuits, “The Hounds of Sound,” as the band is known, recently marched in Indianapolis’ Circle City Classic parade to Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us.”
Wilberforce’s band and choir are “unofficial ambassadors of the college,” Burrell said.
Wilberforce’s enrollment is now at 617 students, up 28 percent over last year, according to the university.
It’s building a new dormitory scheduled to open next fall.
“Institutions willing to fund the technology necessary to recruit students, invest in marketing tools, and invest in the majors that students want can increase enrollment,” Burrell said.
Housing Crunch
Mason, at Common Black College Application, was frequently told by Black parents of college-going students that the dorms at HBCUs were not “satisfactory and facilities like the cafeteria weren’t on point.”
Enrollment at smaller HBCUs — like Coppin State University — is constrained by housing, a critical element in recruitment and retention, said Jinawa McNeil, director of admissions.
The college this fall enrolled 2,208 students, the most since 2011, according to McNeil.
Now, it’s 250 beds short of meeting its housing demands.
Located in a West Baltimore neighborhood with aging housing stock, the college doesn’t have access to many nearby multi-unit apartments.
To house its upperclassmen, Coppin State has turned to private properties in the city’s downtown.
Coppin administrators also don’t want enrollment to grow so fast that students arrive and can’t get the classes they need to graduate on time.
“Everything you do to attract a student and can’t provide, that is reputation-breaking,” McNeil said.
Coppin recently began offering in-state tuition to students who live in states where there are no more than two HBCUs, resulting in tuition rates that come in at or below the price of large regionals in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, McNeil said.
‘Where Black Lives Have Always Mattered’
Morgan State is at a crossroads. The college, along with Maryland’s three other public HBCUs, settled a lawsuit in 2021 against the state after successfully arguing lawmakers underfunded them and allowed predominantly white public institutions to create identical academic programs that lured their potential students away. The $577-million settlement is being paid over a decade to the four Black colleges and is intended to be used for scholarships, financial aid, staffing, and expanding academic programs.
Morgan State is now closing in on the limits of its capacity. Going forward, the college wants to hold steady the number of students it admits, letting in between 2,250 and 2,350 each year, according to Kara Turner, the college’s senior vice president for enrollment management and student success.
If applications don’t slow, Morgan State could end up just as selective as North Carolina A&T.
At one entrance to the campus, an electronic marquee flashes: “Morgan State University: Where Black Lives Have Always Mattered.”
Mells, the 19-year-old junior at Morgan, could have gone to a predominantly white institution, but was deterred by what he sees as rampant racism at many of them.
“You can see in the last few years, where some white students feel emboldened by the political climate to do and say things they might not have said before,” Mells said.
At the Black colleges seeing enrollment growth and a flood of resources, embracing the HBCU experience now doesn’t mean sacrificing facilities or preferred majors.
“There are so many smart people here who look just like me. People I can work with to build something for my community, the Black community,” Mells said.
