"YUa CanofiMxii, ^owvnaf,
Volume Xil; Number 16
Tlie Studeat Newt|iaper of the UanerMly of ?4orth Carolina at Ciiarblte
Qiarlotte, North Carolina
January 31, 1978
UNCCAnd Minority Enrollment
By Les Bowen
As a part of the 16-member UNC
I'stem, UNCC has a stake in the outcome
f the current dispute between UNC and
[EW over desegregation guidelines.
Exactly how that controversy will
Ffect UNCC remains to be seen, but both
hancellor D.W. Colvard and Associate
director of Admissions James A. Scott
>ree that UNCC is in a different position
om the state’s other predominantly white
liblic institutions with regard to minority
irollment, due to a number of factors.
The biggest minority enrollment is
eater proportionally than any of the
ther “white” schools in the system,
lOugh some larger schools actually have
lore minority students.
The reasons for UNCC’s higher ratio
ive to do with the school’s location in an
urban area; its close relationship with CPCC
and other community colleges; a
continuing effort to recruit minority
students headed by Scott, who is black;
and something a bit more elusive having to
do with lack of a tradition of segregation at
UNCC.
Addressing the last point, Colvard said,
“We started in a way that’s different than
the beginning of any other college. N.C.
State was primarily a white, man’s college
oriented toward math and the sciences.
Chapel Hill was a white, man’s college
oriented toward the arts. Fayetteville State
was a black teachers college. UNCC came
after all that, without any built-in bias
toward sex or race from the beginning. If
we have bias, it is of the people and not of
the system.”
Colvard foresaw problems in reaching
the goals HEW asks for.
“We’re committed to trying to protect
and develop the black colleges, and HEW
seems to be committed to that. On the
other hand, they’re saying you’ve got to
drastically increase the number of black
students in predominantly white schools.
Also, they said it wasn’t a quota, it was a
goal. It’s hard to understand what the
difference is.”
The Chancellor was optimistic,
however, that some sort of compromise
could be reached. “HEW is saying ‘do the
best you can; we’re going to look at your
record of performance.’ ”
Scott saw the matter differently,
“Personally, I feel it’s something that has
to be done. In the early 70’s there seemed
to be a concerted effort on the part of
predominantly white schools to increase
minority enrollment. That was the time of
;he most activitism on college campuses.
Today, there seems to be an atmosphere of
‘letting things ride.’
“UNCC is a lot closer to meeting those
goals than a lot of other universities in the
system are,” he continued, “but that’s
tempered by the size of the university. Our
eight percent encompasses fewer students
than some of the others.”
Colvard said UNCC made “a conscious
effort to recruit minority students from the
very beginning. At first we had a very small
program, and we still don’t have a very big
program, but it’s a good one.”
Scott in charge of minority recruiting
since he came here seven years ago, said,
“We’ve had the commitment ever since I’ve
been here, but you run into problems with
money for recruitment.”
(continued on page seven)
Fourth Ward:
rhe Sociology Of Redevelopment
By Brad Rich
Last week, the Carolina Journal
resented the first in a series of articles
ealing with the restoration of the old
ourth Ward neighborhood in downtown
!harlotte. In the first article, architecture
tudent Ron Wilson looked at the
rchitectural aspects of the project and
etermined that the redevelopment of
'ourth Ward was, indeed, an architectural
tatement.
This week, UNCC Dean of Students
lennis Rash, a Fourth Ward homeowner
nd a prime figure in the entire Fourth
ilard project, was interviewed in an
ttempt to discover some of the key
ociological aspects of revitalization efforts.
One of the major questions in this, and
ny redevelopment, is whether or not the
esidents of the neighborhood are forced
'Ut of their homes into inadequate
lousing. Rash said, “A lot of
ehabilitations of old neighborhoods across
he country may have had that problem,
lowever, that has not been the case in
•ourth Ward...the area was almost 50
lercent vacant lots, and of the houses still
landing, about 50 percent were vacant.
)urs had been vacant for about two and a
lalf years before we moved in.”
Rash said that whenever possible, the
'oung, professional people who have
noved into the neighborhood have asked
he old owner of the house (most were
ented) to locate adequate housing for the
)ld residents as a term of the sale. In one
ase. Rash said the person who moved into
house paid moving expenses for the
esidents who were moving out, and helped
hem find a new house.
Rash admitted, though, that in several
nstances residents were displaced in a
nanner that seemed less than ideal. “In
Imost all of these cases, though,” he said,
hhere was an absentee landlord and we
eally didn’t have much control over what
vent on.”
One attempt made to relocate
residents. Rash mentioned, was when
NCNB loaned money to MOTION, a
black-owned corporation, and persuaded
them to rennovate an old apartment
building on 8th Street between Poplar and
Graham streets and turn it into low cost
housing. “I think this is an important step
symbolically,” Rash said, “though maybe
not numerically. It does say, I tWnk, that
we want not to displace people.”
Another key to the success or failure
of the Fourth Ward experiment, probably
the most important question, is how well
the upper-middle class professional
residents and the lower class and elderly
residents on fixed incomes get along
together. Rash said so far there is not any
real socialization between the groups, but
that they have “had some of those
moments of socializing...maybe I’d stop for
a while after working on the house all day
on a Saturday and one of the neighborhood
residents from across the street would
come over...and I’d buy a sixpack of beer
and we’d sit down and drink beer together.
“I did have one run in with a woman,
though,” Rash said, “..,and one of the men
I’d had beer with came over and said
something like, ‘Don’t let her bother you,
she’s just a crazy woman.' That made me
feel kind of good, like some of the
residents were glad to have us there.
“Arrd there is a little gorcery store in
the neighborhood where we do a lot of
shopping, and frankly, they have the best
steaks in the city of Charlotte.
“i don’t think there will ever be a lot
of social interaction, you know, like low-
income residents coming over to eat dinner
with us...I mean you have to have some
things in common,” Rash said, “but I think
there is a healthy respect, a spirit of
tolerance. 1 mean, we kind of look after
one another to make sure there aren’t any
ripoffs. Wlien you live this close together.
As new businesses and families move into Fourth Ward, questions arise
concerning the fate of those who have lived there since before rebuilding.
(Hioto b-v Frank Alexander)
with houses literally only 40 feet apart,
you keep your eyes out.”
One interesting and encouraging fact is
that the children in the neighborhood have
begun to associate with each other to some
degree. “A few of the kids know each other
because they go to the same school...we go
to Irwin Avenue, and it’s almost a
neighborhood school...! wish I thought
everybody was completely devoid of
prejudice, but that’s just not the case. 1
have had had to encourage my older child
to play with some of the lower income
kids, but my younger boy plays with
anybody.
“But I don’t want to misrepresent it to
you. It’s not a natural play relationship yet,
where they come home from School and
immediately go out to play with some of
the black kids. It’s more like if they’re out
playing basketball or something some of
the neighborhood kids just stop by and
start to play. I don’t know why it hasn’t
become natural yet, but it is clear that
there is some relationship there.”
The issue of security also has been
important in the Fourth Ward project. Two
weeks ago, a Carolina Journal photographer
taking pictures in the neighborhood
noticed one house that was fenced in. Rash
said, “Oh yeah, that’s a black family that’s
been in the neighborhood a long time
before we moved in. They had had some
problems with security before...they’ve
lived there about 10 years, I guess, and
that’s really a fine house they live in. They
have made some money, and before we
kind of turned things around they had
(continued on page six)