digg

Join DiggAbout

Discover the best of the web!
Learn more about Digg by taking the tour.

See the original image at cnn.com

Black College Has First White Valedictorian

cnn.com — Joshua Packwood, 22, will become first white valedictorian of Morehouse College. He had a full ride for Columbia University and turned it down to attend the all-black college.

Bury
show profanity settings
expand all
  • mrclark411, on 05/16/2008, -3/+3His economic/family background is exactly the type that we should open the doors for. He is a model example of why we should be offering "class based affirmative action" not race based.
    • MsArtGeek, on 05/16/2008, -2/+3Except there's already need-based aid programs and scholarships for financially disadvantaged students. Why does it have to be an either/or? Why not an and/both?
  • dougerdo, on 05/16/2008, -0/+3This is what I'm talking about you know. Gutsy.
  • BlackGlenn, on 05/16/2008, -1/+7Reading the article about the black students that "had a problem" with him being on campus. Apparently they don't teach the definition of irony at Morehouse.

    Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCU's) were set up for black higher education because blacks weren't being allowed to attend State run and private "White" universities. For a black student attending an HBCU in 2008 to "have a problem" with a white student attending Morehouse shows an appaling failure to understand the historical context in which the Morehouse EVEN EXISTS! What exactly are they teaching kids at Morehouse? Oh, I know, how to self-segregate yourselves along racial lines so that you feel "stronger" as a cohesive unit.

    Retarded reasoning like that is exactly the reason I didn't even consider attending an HBCU when I was a High School Senior. What possible advantage could be gained by going to a school that is 99% black, but when you graduate you're going into a business world that is probably 80% and 20% other? What life lessons are you learning? You can't learn about "our people" at a state-run university? You need to segregate yourself with the bruthas and insulate yourself from the reality?

    I expect to be Dugg up by white people and Dugg down by blacks, but come on my brothas, you know what I'm saying is true...
    • MsArtGeek, on 05/16/2008, -0/+1I don't know if that's necessarily a reflection on Morehouse's education so much as some students's own issues, which can take a long time to shake even WITH education. Fortunately, there's people who will still come along and challenge people to think about their mindset, and I think this guy may have been one of them.

      It's not for everybody, but it's good that there's a choice in what kind of school you can attend. There's religious colleges, secular colleges, men's colleges, women's colleges, state colleges, city colleges, community colleges, international colleges... as much diversity in educational flavors as there are people on the planet.
  • Skeptica, on 05/16/2008, -5/+2He can't be the king of Siam, but he could be king of the jungle, so he chose to be king of the jungle; but why did he have to take the opportunity away from blacks who set up the black colleges so they could have their own to claim the title? Well, as one top school once said, "your 4.0 is not good enough, because you took only the easiest classes." The same can be said to this dude, his 4.0 is not good enough because he competed only with the easiest peers. If he, being white, got drafted into the NBA while attending a black college, it's another story.
    • MsArtGeek, on 05/16/2008, -0/+2Whoa. Back the truck up. You're missing the whole point of the article, and of this young man's attitude. Columbia would have been a qualitatively different experience for him. He chose instead a path that was more meaningful to him, and that took considerably more stones to carry through with. He may not have been valedictorian at Columbia, but I guarantee you his experience was in some ways infinitely more challenging. He didn't do it thinking "oh this should be easy because they're all stupid and I'll outshine them all, that'll show em."

      His 4.0 appears to be not good enough for YOU, because you have fallen prey to exactly the kind of racism that has no place in civil society. He did not take anything away from other students; rather, he gave them something that they might not have had otherwise: an intelligent, well rounded peer who resonated more with Morehouse than Columbia, despite his lack of melanoma.

      The whole point is equality of respect.

      "What Morehouse stands for at the end of the day, and what Dr. King epitomized, it's not about black or white, it's about the content of [a person's] character." - J. Packwood.
  • Nudar, on 05/16/2008, -1/+6My favorite part of the article is when they quote, by name (Vinson Muhammad), a black student at the college who says he wishes Joshua Packwood had attended a different college. Imagine if they quoted a White guy saying that about a black student at a White college.
  • dougerdo, on 05/16/2008, -0/+3I wish Dr. Martin Luther King was alive today.
    • MsArtGeek, on 05/16/2008, -1/+1Well, maybe somewhere his disembodied spirit is looking on with interest and smiling thoughfully.
  •  

    Login or register to add a comment

    Create a new account or login to join in the conversation on Digg. You'll also be able to Digg stories to help promote things you like.


© Digg Inc. 2008 — Content posted by Digg users is dedicated to the public domain.
DIGG, DIGG IT, DUGG, DIGG THIS, Digg graphics, logos, designs, page headers, button icons, scripts, and other service names are the trademarks of Digg Inc.