MOUNT STERLING, Ohio — By most accounts, Melvin Saulsberry has experienced enough traumatic setbacks in his life that the last place you’d expect to find him would be on a college campus.
When he was just 17 years old, his mother passed away, and his father has been incarcerated for as long as he can remember.
But come this May, the 21-year-old sophomore at Broward College in Florida is expected to earn his associate’s degree and plans to eventually transfer to The Ohio State University, where he has dreams of studying nutrition.
“It’s been pretty rough,” says Saulsberry, who lives with his older sister and has taught himself how to apply for financial aid and negotiate the complicated terrain of being a full-time student. “I’ve got set off-track, but the important thing is that I got back on.”
Despite the dismal statistics of Black male college dropout rates that continue to dominate the national headlines, Saulsberry is not an anomaly. There are others just like him, who despite difficult circumstances, have plowed forward and are determined to earn a college degree.
This past weekend, the Fort Lauderdale, Fla., native joined nearly 100 other Black male undergraduate students who journeyed to Deer Creek State Park in Ohio to participate in the ninth annual African American Male retreat sponsored by the Todd A. Bell National Resource Center at The Ohio State University.
