JSU Alumni Official Position on
HBCU Mergers and Closures
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Reissued Thursday, January 28, 2010
The Jackson State University National Alumni
Association is categorically against mergers
and closures of any Mississippi institutions
of higher learning. For over 100 years,
access to a college education has been the
ladder of upward mobility for most
Americans, especially Mississippians. Not
coincidentally, minorities and women in this
state have found a college education to be
prerequisite to upward mobility and access
to productive lives. Indeed, African
Americans view college as the pathway from
poverty-ridden tax burdens to productive tax
producing citizens. The present alignment of
public universities aids and abets the quest
for parity among races and genders. Instead
of reducing or diminishing access to higher
education, efforts ought to be engaged to
enhance access.
We are acutely aware of the present state of
the economy but prevail upon state political
leaders, educational leaders and interested
observers to devise other means of coping
with our fiscal dilemma other than merging
or closing our universities.
In alliance with the alumni associations of
Alcorn State University, Mississippi Valley
State University, and Mississippi University
for Women, the Jackson State University
National Alumni Association is irreversibly
committed to the continued existence of each
affected university as a unique and
autonomous institution to serve the higher
educational, research, and public service
needs of Mississippi, the United States, and
the World.
Hilliard L. Lackey
President
Post Office Box 17820
Jackson, MS 39217
601.979.2281
jsunaapresident@yahoo.com