A select group of students from the Contra Costa Community College District, including 12 directly from Los Medanos College, will be going on a captivating tour of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, otherwise known as HBCUs during Spring Break. The purpose of the tour is to immerse students into the experience of going to an HBCU, institutions home to such rich culture and brilliant academics that have produced so many prominent figures across our communities.

Faith Watkins, chaperone for the spring break tour and counselor for the Umoja Scholars Program at LMC, has been attending the HBCU tour with students for years, calling it “an opportunity of a lifetime.” Watkins encourages all students to go on the tour to “keep an open mind and an open heart,” so that they may fully experience all of the wonderful options that they have in front of them.

“This opportunity is not just about visiting historically Black colleges and universities, but it’s also transformative for them as individuals, as scholars, and as people,” says Watkins.

This year, students will be touring a broad selection of some of the most prestigious HBCUs in the country. The tour will make stops at Dillard University, Southern University and A&M College, Xavier University and Southern University New Orleans in Louisiana; Tuskegee University  in Alabama; and Clark Atlanta University, Morehouse College and Spelman College in Georgia.

However, the tour extends further than just the campuses. Students will be able to learn and experience the resilience and strength of Black history within the South as they visit historic landmarks such as the Whitney Plantation and Legacy Museum.

The tour is generally an eye-opening experience for all that attend and students who participate are often going through a series of firsts. For some it may be their first time flying, leaving California and touring any school before let alone an HBCU. The tour is not just about picking a school for their future, but growing as a human, living through important milestones with their fellow LMC students and building a sense of community with their peers.

“The community you form on a trip like this, spending a week together, is something that continues beyond the trip,” says Jordan Clark, a math professor at LMC and chaperone for this year’s tour. Clark had the opportunity to attend Morehouse, an HBCU that students will be attending on this tour, for his education and enjoys working with young students today to help tap into their full potential. During his time at Morehouse, Clark remembers the values that he learned, reflecting on how his professors, classmates and time at the college helped shape him into what the HBCU would call a “Morehouse man.”

Signifying not just academic excellence, the idea of the “Morehouse man” extends further than the books. “There’s a responsibility of giving back to your community that I don’t always hear emphasized at other places.”

The strong community ties that are forged at HBCUs help breed leaders that go out into the real world and thrive after college, something that students may not experience at predominantly white institutions. A’kilah Smith, current Vice President of Instruction at LMC, attended both Spelman and Howard. Smith says that the space within HBCUs gives students the breathing room to grow and be comfortable as the seeds of success bloom within their time at the schools and are harvested as they continue in the real world.

“I had a friend in my dorm. She just won a Grammy. I have my roommate, she owns a chiropractic firm. I’ve got a lawyer friend, and  I would never have met so many powerful, smart, beautiful, Black women had I not been [to Spelman],” says Smith. “If you have a chance to have that space, even just for four years, why not? You got a lifetime of being in a world that you may not have that space.”

The history of the area that these students will be able to experience during this tour carries great significance. Especially during a time in which many schools are trying to erase it. Previously, the tour had gone to North Carolina A&T State University, just minutes away from where the Greensboro sit-ins occurred and were initiated by students at the school in the 1960s.

The sit-ins were a powerful act of peaceful protests and that served as a pivotal moment in the Civil Rights Movement. 65 years later and Black students continue to reclaim their space in higher education, the workplace and many leadership roles. From politics, to entertainment, to STEM and most notably helping out in their own communities.

This tour will not only help students pick the right school for them but find a new sense of strength and pride in their own culture. Students will be able to familiarize themselves with the moments that help define an era so that they may be left with the tools to create their own path.

An HBCU is like no other in the realm of higher education and anyone who has ever attended one can tell you that.Applications for this year’s tour were open during the Fall 2024 semester.

In order to be eligible to be selected for the tour, interested applicants must be registered for Spring classes, and write a 400-600 word essay on how they are prepared to attend an HBCU and what would they gain from the tour.

Although many students apply, it is a very competetive process in which a total of 36 students are selected throughout the district, 12 from each college.

Those chosen must attend four orientations which prepare the participants for the tour that is offered to students completely free of any cost.

If you would like to experience the HBCU tour yourself next year and step into a legacy of culture, activism and high caliber academics, then make sure to keep an eye out for the application for the HBCU tour in the Fall.