The Reorganization of Southern State Systems of Higher Education: Some Black Perspectives, 1972

This memo from the NAACP assesses the needs of Black education in the wake of desegregation. Among the many criticisms of the current state of affairs, one point resonates with the protests at UT – that curricula were not designed with Black students’ interests in mind. In a distant echo of the early 20th c. debates, the memo recommends that Black colleges innovate by focusing on practical subject areas of direct use to the community. At the same time, the authors raise a concern that the colleges might become too vocational and lacking in prestige.

Courtesy of UT Black Studies Archive, Benson Latin American Collection, LLILAS Benson Latin American Studies and Collections, The University of Texas at Austin.