Historically Black schools feel budget pinch

In a season of strapped state budgets, historically black colleges and universities, reliant on government funds and thin on endowments, have been particularly hard hit, according to black educators attending an annual convention Monday in Houston. The majority of students at public black colleges and universities — about 80 percent — are on financial aid, keeping the institutions from building the kind of fiscal reserves other schools enjoy, said George C. Wright, President of Prairie View A&M University. The endowments at historically black universities are dwarfed by those of other schools, the educators said. Howard University in Washington, D.C., often considered the capstone institution of higher learning for blacks, has the largest endowment of any historically black university, public or private, at around $315 million. The endowment for Harvard University is more than $20 billion. [more]