Timothy L. Fields - The Black Familys Guide to College Admissions: A Conversation about Education, Parenting, and Race

A CONVERSATION ABOUT EDUCATION, PARENTING, AND RACE

T IMOTHY L. F IELDS AND S HEREEM H ERNDON -B ROWN

JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY PRESS

Baltimore

2022 Johns Hopkins University Press

All rights reserved. Published 2022

Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper

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ISBN 978-1-4214-4489-5 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-4214-4490-1 (ebook)

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I dedicate this book to Regent Elridge McMillan and his lifelong dedication to promoting educational access and equality and to the lives of Ramone Harper, Noah Johnson, and Myron Burney, who were living testaments that success has more than one path! #TB4L

TLF

To all my former students at Brooklyn Friends School, Westtown School, Riverdale Country School, and Trinity SchoolI wrote this for you. When you got into your top-choice colleges, I celebrated, and when you didnt, I blamed myself. I could have and should have done more. You drive me to serve my online community and private clients with brutal honesty and relentless effort.

To my childrenSydney, Kerry, Sai, and Samara. My only wish is that you make a contribution to this world as I am trying to do, in your way, and with your style. Just promise me that youll celebrate being young, gifted, and Black.

To my wife, KeriHoward. 1911. 1999. 4ever$.

SHB

On a beautiful January day in 2021 in Washington, DC, a small crowd gathered for the inauguration of Joseph R. Biden as the forty-sixth president of the United States. Although this day, in many ways, was overshadowed by the outgoing president, a tragic domestic terrorist attack on the Capitol earlier that month, and the continuance of the global pandemic that limited attendance and had taken the lives of millions worldwide, there was still so much to celebrate on this historic occasion. With the world watching, we as a country were all able to witness a peaceful transfer of power with several notable Black figures in the crowd, including the first female vice president of the United States, Kamala Harris, who identifies as Black and Indian. Vice President Harris is also the first vice president to have graduated from a Historically Black College and University (HBCU), Howard University, the same school that US Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall had attended for law school years before and which is less than three miles away from the Capitol steps where she was sworn in.

On the dais on this momentous occasion were members of Congress, celebrities, and family members of the elected officials. Among the crowd was the first Black president, Barack Obama, who started his undergraduate education at Occidental College and then transferred to Columbia University. (Occidental is a private predominantly white institution [PWI] in Los Angeles, CA, with 1,839 undergraduates and no graduate students.) He was joined by his wife, former First Lady Michelle Obama, who attended Princeton University. Also attending was Congressman Jim Clyburn, a major catalyst in the election of the new president, donning his South Carolina State University baseball cap and showing great pride in his home state and his HBCU alma mater. Many would argue, though, that the climax of the day was the powerful poem delivered by Amanda Gorman, national youth poet laureate, who attended Harvard College. We mention where these individuals went to college because, for many of us, college is a badge of honor. While there were many others there that day, we highlight these individuals because of the variety in the educational choices they made that may have influenced why they were on that stage on that significant day.

Just as they arrived at their success by different college pathways, many individuals achieve success without going to a well-known or selective college or without going to college at all. The goal of most parents is for their children to live healthy lives, be good citizens, and ultimately become successful, however they may choose to define it. Some define success by simply being admitted to college; others by graduating with a college degree and acquiring accolades and titles through their accomplishments; but most measure success by the amount of money they make. No matter how success is defined, college is usually a part of that equation, as evidenced by President Obama, former First Lady Michelle Obama, Vice President Harris, Congressman Clyburn, and Amanda Gorman. While all of them had different opportunities and life circumstances that may have influenced where they went to college, they all decided to go. Despite differences in resources, size, location, and institutional type, each of the schools offered something that allowed them to grow and experience success in their careers. Did they know when they chose their school, with the help maybe of a parent, college counselor, or family friend, that they would end up on that stage that day as a part of history? Probably not, but the fact that they attended such different universities says a lot about the unique higher education system we have in this country, which offers so many opportunities to students looking for a college education. Such variety is not the case in many parts of the world.