Re: Re: Re: HBCU/NONHBCU is not the issue...
 

At LSU, the General Studies major is set up where a person basically has three minors. My ex-wife, an LSU alumnus, has a friend that got a General Studies degree from there and honestly still does not have a "good" job after being out of undergrad for nearly six years. It is definitely not in the same category as Liberal Arts, at least not in that neck of the woods.

I am sure that Shaq at least did some work in order to complete the degree, but I do find it somewhat ironic that he didn't push to get his degree until after it was announced that a person had to have graduated from LSU in order to be in the Sports Hall of Fame and receive other accolades.

In Friday's Times-Picayune, it said that SUNO (Southern Univ @ New Orleans) will do it's own investigation.

:confused:

From my understanding, General Studies was just a "dumping ground" kind of major. It lets you take courses across the spectrum with no defined prescription. As long as you have a total of x amount of credit hours, you can graduate. GS (to me) means that you have put your hands in almost any and all majors. Therefore, you really don't have a definite grasp on one concept like you would had you focused completely on Nursing, English, Engineering, etc.

That's true. LSU raised the standards to get into certain majors, so a lot of students were left out in the cold. You needed at least a 3.0 overall in your lower-level work in order to major in anything in the College of Business and some other colleges, so a lot of students ended up in either General Studies or other majors as a result. As an English major, I am insulted whenever I hear my major or other Liberal Arts majors being placed in the same category.

HBCU v.s. White
 

My formative years were spent in a majority white environment so I experienced the implications of racism. Since I was young at the time, it was confusing to distinguish patronizing and polite behavior from the majority.

My parents mandated me go to a HBCU for at least one year for a cultural and educational experience. Since the first day, I was totally embraced by everyone I met. I had to admit it was a cultural shock at first. However the alternative for me was assimilation into another white environment. I believe in the premise and mission of historically black colleges and universities. I have sinced graduated, give regular donations, visit often and participate in the alumni chapter.

I am totally shock by comments shared. It reminds me of that old saying, If it's white is right. Anything black (schools, businesses, neighborhoods) is substandard. We will totally go that extra mile to patronized stores, businesses and colleges owned by whites.

I have met several African Americans who went to White public , private and ivy leagues colleges who never give back monetary, do not visit for any reason and only ride on the name of the institution they went to, Duke, Stanford and etc.

Guess what, I ( who graduated from a HBCU) am your collegue, supervisor and manager of the Division. My substandard education has me working along with you. We have arrived at the same destination.

In retrospect, I am glad of my parents mandate. My college experience has enhanced my spiritual, intellectual and physical foundation. However, no college experience is devoid of conflict so give back if you can to the name of the institution that is stated on your diploma.

Peace, Tranquility and Joy Everlasting:D

I was lucky to go to both a HBCU and a PWI. I had better teachers at the HBCU but was less than thrilled with the administration. No, I dont agree that white is right. I chose my school based on the strength of the major I wanted. PERIOD. I ended up at the HBCU b/c I had just had my daughter. College is a big decision. It is my opinion that one should not choose a school SOLELY on the make up of its body (PWI or HBCU). I was just used to better technologies, easier access to my own student records, etc. Having to stand in line to register for a class was not cool to me only b/c I wasnt used to it. I should not have to take a day off of work to register for classes, or spend an inordinate amount of time making sure that XYZ department has whatever information so that I can graduate. But that is MY experience.

I choose not to give back to the HBCU b/c there are several issues there that I need to see resolved before I give them my hard earned money. IF the issues are resolved, I will give some money. I dont give back to the PWI either.

Modding...
 

Uhhhhhhhh excuse me.

Bella Pearl and Nikki et. al. There is a thread regarding HBCU vs PWI around here. Hopefully, it wasn't erased a couple of years ago b/c of GC issues. :mad: @ GC.

Anyhooo, let's stay on the current topic: PEEPS PAYING $$$ TO HAVE GRADES CHANGED until another university has a "scandal". :mad:

Merci. :D

Oh Lawd! Not creating an entire transcript! It's one thing to change a grade, but a transcript. Somebody got some explaining to do.

It's like pulling teeth around here to get a darn transcript and if you owe money...even $5, you ain't getting a transcript until you pay.

Florida A&M president fired
Wednesday, September 29, 2004 Posted: 10:07 AM EDT (1407 GMT)


Florida A&M president Dr. Fred Gainous leaves a Board of Trustees
meeting Tuesday.



TALLAHASSEE, Florida (AP) -- The president of Florida's historically
black public university was fired Tuesday after a little more than a
two-year tenure marked by a dispute over the school's football
program and bookkeeping problems.

Florida A&M board of trustees voted 9-4 to dismiss Fred Gainous
effective December 31. It provided what all agreed was a meaningless
caveat -- that he could keep the job if he wins unanimous board
support by then.

"We knew the job was dangerous when we took it," Gainous said. "We
thought we could make a difference. And I think we have."

Gainous became president of the 13,000-student university in July
2002. His decision earlier this year to delay moving the football
program to NCAA Division I-A left a badly split board and divided
loyalties among the school's alumni.

Gov. Jeb Bush said he supported the decision to remove Gainous,
saying in a statement: "It is my sincere hope that the interests of
FAMU's students remain the school's number one priority."

Trustees chairman James Corbin said there would be a national search
for a replacement. Trustee Barney Bishop III, however, called the
ouster "a railroad job."

"This agenda was manipulated to get the result that they wanted,"
Bishop said.

Though Bishop said he feared the decision would slow fund-raising
efforts, a faculty member said it was time for a change.

"Sooner or later, you can't continue to say, 'Sorry I made a
mistake,"' said William Tucker, president of the university's chapter
of the United Faculty of Florida. "Too much water had gone under the
bridge for the situation to be salvageable."

Among other problems, a 2003 review found the school's construction
budget was off by more than $3 million.

Living in Tallahassee, I'm very familiar with what's going on over there at FAMU. This situation has been brewing for months. The alumni were not happy with Dr. Gainous at all. He came in with good intentions I believe, but who knows what went wrong. I know there move to Division I-A was wrong! They moved without even a forethought to what i was gonna take to actually make the jump. Not talking just being successful, I mean upgrading athletic facilities, providing more athletic scholarships etc. I never wanted to go to FAMU but they do have a few nationallly renownd programs. Recently the much maligned financial aid dept. accidentally sent people double net checks. And a girl I know who is a student at FAMU, her net check was sitting at the bottom of a pile. If she didn't go in to the office, she might have never gotten it. And it's not the students. It's the average HS Diploma workers, that live in Frenchtown who are the problem.(If you're familiar with Tallahassee, you know how Frenchtown is.) They just need someone to come in and overhaul the entire University. FAMU is a good school with a rich legacy! Something has to be done!

I am so afraid that my alma mater will become an FSU Annex. :(
From jump, everyone had reservations about Gainous. I figured it was because most people loved Humphries (our previous prez) so much that they didnt think anyone could fill his shoes.
What FAMU needs to do is stop chosing presidents according who was their classmates (this is not a popularity contest) and choose someone who is QUALIFIED. They are just giving Jeb a reason to step in and take over, tripping over themselves to show these saltines that we can't take care of business on our own...It is just sad to see your alma mater fall apart before your eyes :(

Gainous really got in trouble when he wanted to merge some programs with TCC. Even if it wasn't initially his idea, he should have been astute enough to talk to Trustee members individually to gain some support instead of allowing them to read about it in the newspaper. He was brought to FAMU to fix the problems, not to build a legacy of his accomplishments. Had he addressed the overwhelming problems at FAMU first, I'm confident he wouldn't have been in this situation.


ps: Skeephistakate:

When were you at FAMU? pm me!

Hmmmmm... Interesting...
 

Gainous spoke at my Grandfather's funeral at Bethune-Cookman College in 1994...

He had come from a rich legacy of African American Floridian educators...

I imagine his leadership style is such that it was "old school" rather than the corporate leadership it takes to run any college or university... When I say "old school" leadership, I am talking knocking on doors and having bake sales for endowed planned gifts and fundraising...

Sad for FAMU because several of my cousins graduated from excellent programs, there...

Oh well, Bethune-Cookman College will have an anniversary this coming weekend. My folks will be there with my grandmother!!! In fact my father donates more money to BCC than his alma mater, Fisk...

Why is it that we have such a hard time trying to run our schools like BUSINESSES? HBCUs will end as we know it if we keep doing this.. :(

Jody your box is full.

I know I know. We must PRAY for them!

Being a FAMU Alum. it is very disheartening to hear and read about all of the turmoil surrounding the university this past year. I just pray that some rays of sunshine will prevail soon from this dark cloud.

FAMU Financially Shuts Down Football Program:

http://www.wctv6.com/sports/headlines/1108652.html

:eek: Oh. my. word!

Yeah. :eek: :(

I KNOW the alums are NOT going to sit back and just LET THAT HAPPEN. FAMU has a long/rich football tradition. I hope something can be done to restore funding. :(

From an Alum
 

I was heartbroken when I saw this on the news last night.:( I mean really, where is the Marching 100 going to play? at the baseball games?

I love my school and I hate to see this happening. Be prepared to see heads rolling!

Even with that being the case (and I agree with you), I'm still saddened to see the school just give up on the program like that. What were the powers that be expecting in just 2 years? And if the football program is being shut down like that, what will be the fate of other sports? Honestly, I know more about FAMU's football than basketball, etc, so it makes NO sense to cripple the better known program.

Also, SKEEphistAKAte hit the nail on the head about the band. Doing that much damage to the football program can only cause a ripple effect that will hurt other programs and activities.

I hope that FAMU alumni can unite to help their school. I'm not a product of an HBCU, but FAMU is a school I would definitely hate to see go the way of Morris Brown.

one of the problems the football program had this year is that they had a much tougher schedule due to the fact that they played some I-A white schools who they had already scheduled when they moved to I-A. However, they couldn't even beat their past MEAC division rival at the Florida Classic. Many alumni feel that Billy Joe's tenure as coach is up. For the past few seasons they have been performing under expected performance.

i can't imagine that the athletic dept. can be so much and debt that they would take away any spending from the life blood of their the dept. i think that dr. ramsey wants coach joe out and that he's just using this as some kind of leverage against joe. rev. dr r.b holmes one of the trustee members said they were going too look into it. who knows. i believe that yesterday they named an interim pres. yesterday. i'll try and pull up the article from the democrat. oh i forgot, they haven't beaten bcc at the classic in the last 2 or 3 seasons.

:( We've lost to BCC for a record 3 years in a row.

I'm still glad I'm a grad. of FAMU!!!
 

Say it isn't so!

.:eek:

Hopefully FAM. can bounce back from this.

Got this from another listserve
 

http://www.meacfans.com/ubb/ultimate.../t/003674.html
posted 03 December, 2004 18:14
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
FAMU football gets its money

Trips for recruiting, search for defensive coordinator back on

By Randy Beard

DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

Good news really does travel fast.

The first thing Florida A&M football coach Billy Joe did after getting off
the telephone with athletic director Joseph Ramsey II Thursday morning was
to tell his assistant coaches to hit the road.

"I told them to get their itineraries together because we can go recruiting
again," said Joe. "They can go to Miami. They can go out of state now. As a
matter of fact, they are all gone on the road now."

Joe also received permission to start lining up candidates for his vacant
defensive coordinator job.

The news brought to a close a divisive couple of days in the FAMU athletic
department. Ramsey had told Joe during a Monday morning meeting that the
football program's $100,000 recruiting budget - guaranteed in Joe's
contract - had been frozen.

However, Ramsey said he told Joe the money was only on hold until after he
met with Larry Reese, FAMU's vice president for administrative and financial
services, to address the athletic department's revenue shortfalls. Joe said
he was told there would be no money available for the football staff to do
any recruiting. He said there was never any mention of it being a temporary
freeze of the budget.

But bottom line, the money is now there.

"(Ramsey) said that we do have recruiting money. I asked him if it was
$100,000, and he said I had what was in my contract," said Joe. "That's all
I wanted to hear."

The athletic department still has some tough choices to make, but Ramsey
said the football budget was intact.

"Even though our financial situation looks pretty bleak ... we are going to
try to keep football intact," said Ramsey. "Football is our money-maker when
everything goes well, so you really don't want to tamper with it too much."

Ramsey said that the athletic department budget, which had a $700,000
shortfall last year, took another hit when the school rescinded its plan to
move to NCAA Division I-A. He said that when FAMU announced it was returning
to I-AA status, that Illinois, Tulane, Temple and Virginia Tech each cut
their revenue guarantees in half. Attendance at the games also failed to
kick in a revenue-sharing agreement.

"We knew we were off in our projections by about $400,000 after the Tulane
and Temple games," said Ramsey. "All the I-A schools cut their guarantees by
half. The only one that didn't was FIU (Florida International)."

As for the defensive coordinator position, Joe said he has at least three
candidates in mind that he wants to contact. The expected salary for the
position will be in the $72-75,000 range.

An Update
 

10 Former Students Lose Degrees in Southern U. Grade-Changing Scandal
Date: Thursday, January 05, 2006
By: Nikki G. Bannister, Black College Wire

Ten former students at Southern University have lost their degrees after a two-year investigation into charges that a student presented false credentials to the graduate school.

The former students are subject to criminal indictment.

A former assistant registrar pleaded guilty Dec. 19 to bribery charges stemming from the grade-buying scandal, according to the Baton Rouge Advocate, which said that Cleo Carroll Jr., 56, of Baton Rouge, faced up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

A sentencing hearing was expected in late February or March, the newspaper said.

Carroll was accused of taking $7,700 from five former and current students to change their transcripts. Prosecutors alleged that Carroll took bribes between October 2001 and February 2003. He worked at the university from 1971 until 2003.

Read the rest here.

^^^^ That's good for them. It's bad enough that you get false grades in order to graduate in the first place, but you submit said false grades to the SAME university to enter the graduate program!! How retarded can you be? They must have thought that because their degree/transcripts were already from SU that it was smooth sailing for admissions and none of their credentials would be checked. WRONG!!!

They'd be lucky to even be able to get a degree from anywhere, let alone a job with such blemishes on their permanant record. *SMH*

Did you see homeboy who will get his bachelors and masters degrees revoked?

But help me out with this one:
Takiyah Peoples of Baker, bachelor's in therapeutic recreation and leisure, 2001.

Therapeutic recreation and leisure? what is that? Never heard of it.:confused:

My husband graduated from Southern in this major, it is like recreational theraphy, you can pursue physical therapy, he took the recreation aspect like program planning (recreational centers, parks, nursing homes, gyms, etc) he did an intern at a nursing home and the crazy house in Shreveport where he planned out recreational activites. :D

Soror, you have me CTFU with this statement!! I didn't think that many people still called "those" institutions "crazy houses." I do, but it's still funny when someone else calls them that too!!

I was :eek: when I learned she was in the group. My LS was her babysitter when we were in college. Her father was an admin @ GSU back then.


I was thinking...dayum, we are old. :o


The case still isn't closed. :o

Her Mom taught me at SU actually her mom was like an assoc. dean in the Education Dept. (which therapeutic recreation and leisure fall under).

Richard Dumas is Walter Dumas's son (well known lawyer in BR). He was even enrolled in Law School.

Re: Dumas. I know...

Those kids didn't have that to do, but then again in BR.... (nevermind (sigh)) :rolleyes:


The Peoples left Gram right before I graduated. Dr. P became the Chancellor @ SUNO, then they came up to BR.

Her mother and my cousin are co-workers. Don't tell me 'bout dem peeples! :p :D :o

Suit to Prevent Close of Clark Atlanta Engineering Dept. Tossed
Date: Monday, January 23, 2006
By: Errin Haines, Associated Press

ATLANTA (AP) - A judge has thrown out a lawsuit questioning the shutdown of Clark Atlanta University's engineering department, ruling the historically black private institution acted within its rights.

A group of engineering faculty and students sued the school in October, alleging its president and board of trustees wrongly closed the department without first seeking wider input.

http://www.blackamericaweb.com/site....arkatlanta0124