Congresswoman Marilyn Strickland along with several other congressional advocates are betting their political capital on the brilliant minds that attend historically Black colleges and universities (HBCU), as they have introduced the ‘‘HBCU Research, Innovation, Security, and Excellence Act’’ (RISE Act) which will bring federal dollars in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics to HBCUs.
According to Strickland, HBCUs hold a unique position in the efforts to diversify the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in the United States, and the RISE ACT will help provide the necessary resources for HBCUs to strengthen their programs and allow their graduates to pursue and develop innovative ideas that will impact our society.
“The HBCU RISE Act will help HBCUs remain competitive against other academic institutions by creating equitable research opportunities,” says Strickland. “As a proud graduate of Clark Atlanta University, it is critical that we support minority-serving institutions by investing in HBCUs so that students and faculty can achieve research success.”
HBCUs comprise just 3 percent of the colleges and universities in the United States but graduate 25 percent of African American students with undergraduate degrees in the fields of technology, mathematics, science and engineering. In addition, HBCUs produce almost 30 percent of Black graduates in the fields of engineering and doctoral programs in science.
“It is important to the HBCU Caucus in Congress, a group of legislators who attended historically Black colleges and universities, to support and acknowledge the talent these universities possess and produce,” said Strickland.
In 2019, HBCUs received just $37 million of the $44.5 billion in Federal funding distributed to institutions of higher learning for research and development. The amount of funding for 2019 decreased from 2018, when HBCUs received $40 million in Federal research and development funding.
“Our HBCUs received about 0.8 percent of the total funding from the federal government here in the United States in 2019,” says Strickland. “Just a year prior in 2018, 0.9 percent of the Federal funding went to Black institutions of higher education were used for such purposes.”
Proponents of the RISE Act says that it is designed to produce a pilot program that illustrates to Congress, the Department of Defense — which is the largest donor of funds to STEM programs in the nation — and other partners that HBCUs are capable of developing R1 or “very high research activity” status research programs, which are eligible for significant amounts of federal funding because of their R1 status as classified by the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. Currently, there are no HBCUs designated as an R1 program.
“HBCU’s at this moment are a R2 status meaning “high research activity status” and the goal of this pilot program is to help them reach the R1 status making them eligible for grant funding and this will strengthen their research capabilities, making them that much more competitive in the market,” says Strickland.
“Meaningfully investing in the research capacity of historically Black colleges and universities is an investment in our nation’s future,” Strickland adds. “This bill will help meet accelerating science, technology, engineering and mathematics workforce demands and safeguard the national security interests of the United States.”