They were often the first students in their family to go to college and the very idea of higher education was still foreign to them. They had to make a conscious and often difficult decision to come to college.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
My parents started with very little and were the only ones in their families to graduate from college. As parents, they focused on education, but did not stop at academics - they made sure that we knew music, saw art and theatre and traveled - even though it meant budgeting like crazy.
My parents weren't stereotypical and pressuring me to go to college. They mentioned it a lot and constantly, but it wasn't a do or die thing, like, 'You have to do this or you're done.'
Typically, historical black colleges and universities like Delaware State, attracted students who were raised in an environment where going to college wasn't the next natural step after high school.
It's just become such a business, getting into college. I see that a lot in my friends, their parents were so on top of them about getting into an Ivy League school since they were so young, they were just drilled and drilled and drilled, to the point that they just don't know why they want to go.
Their families helped them realize that there was more out there for them. These students came to Delaware State because of its inexpensive tuition, closeness to home, and solid reputation.
It's true that many of the leaders who started at non-elite colleges as undergrads later attended prominent graduate schools in law, business, medicine, and so on. But the point is that they found their own way there - as young men and women in their early 20s, not teenagers pressed into action by parents and peers.
Universities used to prepare young adults for the real world. I dare say the graduates today go in without a clue and graduate without a clue. It's time to acknowledge the college degree is not worth what it was in the past. Times are changing, and so is the way we prepare our youth to survive in a competitive world.
My undergraduate education, at the City College in New York, was made possible only by the existence of that excellent free institution and the financial sacrifices of my parents.
My mom never went to college, but for her own children, getting a great education was not an option.
I was the first person to go to university from my family.