At an HBCU, you are in the numerical majority. This allows you to achieve a level of comfort with yourself and with the people around you that's not possible when you are one of 150 Black kids out of 2,000 students at a PWI.

For one, the burden of representation and the threat of racial stereotyping are non-existent. You don’t have to worry about whether people are going to think this about you or that about you because you're Black. You don’t have to worry about “representing well.” You don’t have to worry about whether your peers think you're there only because of affirmative action or worry about your opinions, experiences and contributions to discussions being devalued because “of course you think that, you’re Black.” You won’t experience overt racism or constant racial microaggressions nearly as often. You can be yourself and be at ease with the knowledge that your presence is valued, your opinions are respected and appreciated, and that excellence is assumed of you, no less than. You don’t have to feel like you must prove anything to anybody.

via GIPHY

Furthermore, you experience a certain cultural connection with the majority of the student body and relate to them in more ways than you would most students at a PWI. This manifests itself in ways that might seem insignificant until you are in an environment completely void of all of them at once. That means things like people understanding the slang you use, being familiar with classic songs by Erykah Badu and Snoop Dogg, and having the rhythm to join you when your song comes on and it’s time to hit the latest dance. Too, Black people interact with each other differently amongst themselves than they do in mixed company. That's a reality.

Being in an environment in which you feel comfortable is critical to the college experience. After all, the campus you choose will be your home for four years. People often want to learn from being outside of their comfort zone, but there's a difference between being forced outside of your comfort zone on occasion and learning from that experience and never, ever being comfortable at all. The former can occur on an HBCU campus. By contrast, four years is a long time to be uncomfortable in your own home. The kind of comfort and connection achieved at an HBCU allows for an honesty and an openness with your peers that enables you to explore and learn about yourself and from others at a greater depth than is possible in an environment in which you feel alienated — or worse, rejected.

Too, it facilitates the development of a groundedness in your blackness and a confidence necessary for navigating the rest of the largely white world in professional spaces and elsewhere.

At an HBCU, you never feel starved for blackness. At a PWI, that starvation is the norm.

Brandon Ellington Patterson

Writing since September 2015 · 1 story contributed