AUTHOR: FINANCIAL JUNETEENTH
REPOSTED BY CIVILRIGHTSAGENDA.COM
This is a great story about a young man who chose an HBCU over Harvard. Instead of the 16-year old genius Ralph Jones taking Harvard up on their offer, he chose Florida A&M University.
The story received national attention, but we have to ask ourselves: Are we naive to automatically assume that Ivy League Universities are better for black students than the leading HBCUs? Is a black woman out of Spelman any worse off than she would have been had she attended a predominantly white university? 
Strong HBCUs do an amazing job of giving students confidence, a great college experience and a strong racial identity. At the same time, many students attending predominantly white universities leave the campuses feeling frustrated, disconnected and forced to assimilate.
The Financial Juneteenth angle of this story is that it might be time to let go of the idea that white universities are better for black children than HBCUs. This mindset of one that is reflective of white supremacy and always reminds us that in order to get a high quality product, we must put our lives and futures under the domain of our historical oppressors. This is almost NEVER a good personal investment.
Read the story below:
When a boy enters first grade at the age of 4 and high school at the age of 12, it’s a foregone conclusion that the child will end up at a Harvard or a Stanford or a Cornell. Right? Not if the boy is Ralph Jones Jr., a 16-year-old freshman at Florida A&M University who has received national attention in recent days for passing up opportunities at the 45 other schools that accepted him — including the prestigious institutions listed above — to attend the Tallahassee, Fla., HBCU.
Jones said that for him it wasn’t about whether or not a school was an Ivy League — he thought about location, scholarship offers, campus atmosphere and the institution’s engineering program in making his decision. “Entering college at the age of 16,” Jones told The Root, “I think that my motives behind choosing were a little bit different than other people’s. One, I looked at distance from home. Florida A&M is about 300 miles away from my hometown of Atlanta, so that was something that was really important to me, whereas if I had gone somewhere that was considered an Ivy, that would have been a good 2,000.”
The proximity is important because he is so much younger than the average freshman, he said. His parents have already had to drive down to his school twice from Atlanta to sign forms for him because of his age. He also said it’s long been one of his goals to go to college for free. Many of his top choices were either too far away or did not offer him a full ride. Harvard and Stanford, for example, offered him some money but not a full scholarship. Cornell and Kettering offered full scholarships but were too far away for his liking. Georgia Tech, his No. 1 choice, did not offer a full scholarship.
READ MORE via Controversy Over 16-Year-Old FAMU Student Ralph Jones Who Chose an HBCU Over Harvard – The Root.
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