In a state where lawmakers currently are debating a bill that would
scale back state-sanctioned affirmative action policies, a University
of South Carolina (USC) faculty member is trying to lure
under-represented minorities into the collegiate teaching ranks.
Dr. Aretha Pigford, a professor of education, says she believes she
can raise $150,000 over the next few months to pay stipends for ten
Ph.D. candidates who could begin their final push toward a terminal
degree at the University’s flagship campus in Columbia this fall.
Pigford’s three-year goal is to have thirty students at USC, thus
adding to a pipeline that produces just 1,400 Black Ph.D.s annually,
according to the National Library of Education.
The centerpiece of Pigford’s vision is a pledge that students will
be paired with enthusiastic mentors willing to share teaching secrets
and nurture teaching skills.
“Mentoring is important in education, period,” says Dr. Michael
Nettles, executive director of the Frederick D. Patterson Research
Institute, which studies ways to improve educational opportunities for
minorities. And, he says, “The mentor doesn’t have to be the same race
as the student.”
According to Nettles, it is more important that a student have
someone to depend upon for advice and guidance, and that the
relationship function as a partnership.
With the help of a planning grant from the Kellogg Foundation,
Pigford has spent the past year trying to drum up support for her idea.
If she ran raise the necessary matching funds, she stands to receive
nearly $1 million in Kellogg grants over five years.
Betty Overton, Kellogg’s higher education program director, says
the foundation is “very excited about…this project. It integrates
into higher education our theme of capitalizing on diversity.”
