(RNS) — Angelique Desiree Carney Howse has many titles: Baptist minister, well being care advisor, scholar advocate.
Come Could 11, when she graduates from the Interdenominational Theological Middle in Atlanta, she’s going to obtain one other title: Physician. “I’m relieved as a result of this time final yr I didn’t know if I used to be going to have the ability to end,” stated Howse, the president of ITC’s Scholar Christian League. “I didn’t know if the varsity was going to exist.”
ITC, a consortium of seminaries in Atlanta recognized for its many years of training Black ministers, is considered one of a number of faith-based traditionally Black schools and universities which have been fighting accreditation and different challenges, whilst different HBCUs are seeing will increase in enrollment and infusions of donations.
Howse credited the Rev. Maisha Useful, ITC’s interim president since September, with bettering the middle because it declared “monetary exigency” final April, saying it could scale back college, droop applications and restructure operations.
“The place we have been this time final yr, we’ve made a whole 180,” Howse stated. “For certain, interim President Useful has accomplished the inconceivable, made a means out of no means utterly. We have been in dire monetary straits.” (Useful couldn’t be reached instantly for an interview.)
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ITC isn’t out of the woods. The Southern Affiliation of Schools and Faculties Fee on Schools, an accrediting company, has positioned the middle on probation, citing governance and monetary considerations.
The company has positioned Virginia Union College — residence of the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Faculty of Theology — on probation for comparable causes, and St. Augustine’s College in North Carolina is awaiting arbitration proceedings after the fee decided its accreditation must be terminated.
“Throughout our appeals course of, they didn’t permit us to indicate any new proof,” stated Marcus Burgess, interim president of SAU, who took on the function after SACSCOC’s ruling and has labored to convey the varsity nearer to compliance, “rightsizing” the funds and making college and employees cuts earlier than Christmas and once more earlier this yr.
Virginia Union College officers didn’t reply to a request for remark about its accreditation standing. In a Regularly Requested Questions web page on its web site, the varsity expressed confidence in addressing the requests of the accrediting physique.
“The College is continuous to broaden the Enterprise Workplace, strengthening our inner fiscal
infrastructure to accommodate the College’s development,” stated the varsity, which dates to 1865. “This consists of streamlining processes and decreasing the time it takes to perform transactions.”
Accreditation questions can hurt a college’s prospects even because it fights its strategy to solvency. ITC has seen a major drop in its enrollment over the past decade. The Affiliation of Theological Faculties, ITC’s second accrediting physique, which lists the varsity in good standing, studies it had 448 college students within the 2003-04 yr, in contrast with 61 in 2023-24.
SAU, based in 1867 by the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina, noticed decreases in enrollment, leaving it with about 750 college students.
“From fall to spring we most likely misplaced about 200 college students,” Burgess stated. The varsity is thought for being the childhood residence of Sarah and A. Elizabeth Delany, authors of the bestseller “Having Our Say,” whose father, Henry Beard Delany, was one of many first Black bishops consecrated within the Episcopal Church.
On April 1, Burgess shifted the varsity to distant courses. “I needed to minimize my prices so I went distant to attempt to cease the bleeding,” he stated. “We’re looking for somewhat over $5 million or higher to assist us with the combat to pay for authorized charges, to assist shore up payrolls, to get issues again so as.”
As of mid-April, Burgess stated the varsity had acquired $400,000 in money and extra in-kind donations that introduced the entire to about $1 million.
He stated graduation “will go on as regular” on Could 4, with greater than 120 graduates being honored.
As they battle to keep up their accreditations, some HBCUs are receiving assist from the United Negro School Fund, which introduced early this yr that it had obtained a $100 million grant from Lilly Endowment to bolster the endowments of the fund’s 37 member establishments, together with faith-based HBCUs similar to ITC and SAU.
Beginning subsequent yr, every of these colleges, which should be a part of UNCF in extra fundraising for the marketing campaign, are anticipated to obtain an estimated $100,000 from a pooled endowment fund, along with common disbursements they obtain from the group amounting to about $750,000 annually.
UNCF President Michael Lomax stated the long-term assist is required to assist maintain these colleges, even when some are troubled within the brief time period.
“Denominationally associated small, liberal arts and complete schools, city and rural, are most likely among the many most at-risk non-public establishments within the nation,” Lomax advised Faith Information Service. “And amongst these are some HBCUs.”
He stated his group additional aids member colleges by discovering and inspiring donors who would possibly assist them. Lomax stated UNCF is working in partnership with ITC and SAU on assembly operational requirements and constructing property.
Neighborhood members, church buildings and alumni have been serving to HBCUs coping with monetary issues by giving money, meals and in-kind items. ITC famous on its Fb web page that Elizabeth Baptist Church in Atlanta gave Useful a $10,000 donation on “HBCU Sunday” in February. Burgess stated he acquired $7,000 from a Virginia Episcopal church he visited in mid-April.
C.E. Patten II, a 2006 alumnus of ITC who was COO of the varsity from 2019 to 2021, stated ITC’s challenges are advanced.
“It’s partially the results of one thing that I feel occurs within the Black church generally: It’s about whether or not or not our leaders at all times have the correct set of administrative expertise to serve of their function,” stated Patten, a technique advisor and a former vp of the Church of God in Christ World Missions.
He believes Useful and the present board “understand that it’s not an in a single day job” to beat selections made by former faculty officers.
A dozen ITC college students have continued their work towards Grasp of Divinity levels at Emory College’s Candler Faculty of Theology, which created a teach-out association that waived software charges for ITC college students and allowed them to proceed pursuing their training with out a rise in prices.
“It was an ideal synergy,” stated Sam Martinez, affiliate dean of admissions and monetary support at Candler, which has 419 college students, together with 275 within the M.Div. program that launched a hybrid plan within the fall of 2023 in its place for its members.
“So we already had an possibility for these college students.”
In a Friday (April 26) electronic mail, ITC’s Useful advised RNS that “our Grasp of Divinity program was reopened in January of this yr with new scholar enrollment.”
Cathryn Stout, one of many college students who has moved to Candler from ITC by way of the teach-out association, stated her transition was a “very clean” one.
“I actually appreciated my time at ITC as a result of it’s the place I realized about theology from an Afrocentric lens and that perspective has continued to form my religion and my understanding of not solely faith, but in addition the world,” stated Stout, a historical past scholar who hopes to make use of her ITC diploma to pursue her aim of writing biographies of religion leaders.
“And although I’m at Candler now, I nonetheless assist each establishments. I feel there’s a spot for each establishments.”
Howse, who’s ordained by the Nationwide Baptist Conference of America, stated she juggled distant courses whereas working a full-time job onboarding contractors for an Atlanta hospital system. At the same time as her stipend for working as a campus chief was stopped, she advocated for alumni to financially assist the varsity.
Now, Howse stated she expects to proceed to assist her faculty and different HBCUs.
“It’s been traumatic,” she stated in an interview the day earlier than she defended her dissertation on illness prevention and well being promotion in Black church buildings. “Now that I’m on the finish of this factor, I’m wanting ahead to being accomplished. However my doneness isn’t a disconnecting.”
Faith Information Service receives funding from Lilly Endowment by way of the Faith Information Basis.
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