F or a couple of days last week, it looked like Elizabeth City State University was going to be shut down. The N.C. Senate put a provision into their budget that may have meant the future closing of the school. It mandated that the Board of Governors study the feasibility of closing schools with a full-time enrollment decrease of 20 percent or more since 2010.
ECSU is the only school currently fitting those stipulations, suggesting legislators were deliberately targeting the school. After tremendous public pressure, the Senate amended the budget to remove the provision — but ECSU is not out of danger yet.
ECSU is a great school and when a great school struggles, we should help them, not cut them out of the system. ECSU is the third-leading employer in their region and produces students who later serve their community as teachers. Their graduates constitute 64 percent of elementary teachers and 38 percent of teachers overall in their geographic area. And the school has the lowest tuition of all North Carolina schools. ECSU serves many students who might not otherwise get a chance at a four-year degree.
It’s true, ECSU’s enrollment has declined by 26 percent from 2010 to 2013, but this year the U.S. News and World Report ranked ECSU first in the Top Public Schools Regional Colleges for the South category.
North Carolina’s five historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), including ECSU, have been underfunded for as long as they have existed. Our school has the most funding of all UNC-system schools and Elizabeth City receives the least. It’s time for UNC students to speak up against the discriminatory underfunding of ECSU and all other HBCUs.
Legislators think we’re not paying attention and don’t care about our fellow students. You may not know any ECSU students, you may have never even heard of the school, but this threat to public education matters to all of us. Imagine going to class knowing your school could be shut down by February. North Carolina students deserve better.
The General Assembly needs to stop playing games with our education. The attacks on ECSU are attacks on all public schools, especially HBCUs.
The provision that would begin the closure of the school has been removed from the Senate’s version of the budget, but the House is currently writing their budget and ECSU could very well be included. There’s no reason to believe North Carolina will stop attacking HBCUs any time soon.
But we can fight back and stand with ECSU students, parents and alumni. Let’s prove the state wrong, and demand the House support ECSU, HBCUs and access to public education in their upcoming budget.
