Anonymous wrote:I believe the HBCU experience will be similar at most schools from Spelman to Bowie State. HBCUS pride themselves on nurturing the student you identifying with your heritage. A number of students will be a combination of lower social economic backgrounds, possible 1st generation college students etc.

While I don’t disagree with your description of some of the similarities, the student experience and school culture at Spelman — will be very different from Howard, which will be different from Southern, which will be different from Bowie State.

That’s just my experience and opinion. That’s like comparing Smith with Rutgers. They do have many similarities, but very significant differences as well.

I believe the HBCU experience will be similar at most schools from Spelman to Bowie State. HBCUS pride themselves on nurturing the student you identifying with your heritage. A number of students will be a combination of lower social economic backgrounds, possible 1st generation college students etc.

Howard is the most overrated. My daughter just graduated from there and it defiantly did not live up to the hype.

Claflin University

Fisk

Grambling State. I know someone who went there and loved it

I know nothing about many of the colleges listed bc like so many others, I only know the big names in HBCUs. But it does open some good questions, especially if you are looking for a place that needs support. Maybe one of the metrics to consider is colleges that raise the socioeconomic standing of their graduates. They have hard working, devoted faculty that support their students. If you only look at SAT scores, it’s easy to be dismissive. But if you consider there are smart kids from poor urban and rural high schools who just never had the solid education coming up, but got themselves into college, you can help make change supporting places like this. I’d be interested in places with a positive sense of community and strong faculty. Not sure what you need to comb through to find this. Eager to read more posts.

Anonymous wrote:My family has three generations of HBCU graduates. Underrated HBCUs are, for example - Johnson C. Smith, Dillard University, Fayetteville State, Alabama A&M, Elizabeth City, Miles College, Bethune Cookman, Clark, and Lincoln University-PA, Most people heard about Spelman, Morehouse, Howard, Tuskegee, and North Carolina A&T

How are they underrated? Or do you mean they're just less well-known, which has nothing to do with whether they produce outcomes which exceed expectations? If they perform as expected, they are not underrated, whether that performance is good or bad.

Anonymous wrote:What are the most underrated historically black colleges in your opinion?

UDC?

My family has three generations of HBCU graduates. Underrated HBCUs are, for example - Johnson C. Smith, Dillard University, Fayetteville State, Alabama A&M, Elizabeth City, Miles College, Bethune Cookman, Clark, and Lincoln University-PA, Most people heard about Spelman, Morehouse, Howard, Tuskegee, and North Carolina A&T

Ratings for schools generally, not just HBCUs, reflect a range of objective and subjective measures. While people do quibble over the granular details, most ratings do reflect pretty well the kinds of measures the ratings purport to illustrate: how competitive is admission, graduation rates, faculty research and publications, the caliber of academic resources available to students like libraries and labs, average salaries upon graduation, % of students going on to grad school, and so on. To be under or over-rated, is by definition going to be unusual because that means those measures have been captured inaccurately to a significant degree.

What does underrated mean here? Incoming student body is better credentialed than assumed? Graduation rates are better than generally perceived? Graduates get better jobs at higher salaries than the school's reputation would seem to warrant?

The notion of "underrated" implies that reality differs from perception, so you'd have to explain which reality is misaligned from which perception in order for the question to be meaningful.

Anonymous wrote:If I wanted to donate to support HBCUs is the HBCU Foundation a good organization? Other similar organizations? Or isthe alternative to just donate directly to some of the schools identified above?

It’s best to make a donation directly to the HBCU of your choice.

If I wanted to donate to support HBCUs is the HBCU Foundation a good organization? Other similar organizations? Or isthe alternative to just donate directly to some of the schools identified above?

Tennessee State University

Loyola University New Orleans