To Be Young, Gifted, Black, and a Jazz Enthusiast: Apparent Needle in a Haystack

The One About…

Anthony Harris

Opinions Section Editor

anthonydeanharris@gmail.com

My school has become some sort of punch line in multiple avenues. Stop me if you’ve heard this one.

A couple of weeks ago I scaled my way to the second floor of Gloster to pick up a check for my tutoring. The person in charge of distributing checks had a few steps he had to undertake in order to pay me. I waited as patiently as I could despite the fact that I was broke until he gave me my check and I had class at noon. We talked about how Clark Atlanta’s payroll uses direct deposit in all of their cases. The person in charge of payroll stated that the reason why we are using technology from the 1980’s was that this was Morehouse.

In a conversation I had with a professor in his office, he remarked about how he once had a student who walked from Spelman’s Cosby building to discuss something with him. Upon walking into this professor’s office, the student abruptly burst into laughter. He said that the desks in Cosby are made of oak; the offices are large, warm and comfortable. Here, the professors are expected to prepare for their classes in two to a closet. This professor told me that this is the way Morehouse has been.

A rumor is circulating about the campus that there is some nefarious reason why refunds were distributed in their late manner. The refunds were withheld for a longer period of time because the rumor is that all funds were placed into a large bank account for a month where the school could collect interest, then close the account and distribute the money to the students. This story is concluded with students saying that this is just Morehouse being Morehouse.

Parties at Emory and Georgia Tech are wary of seeing large groups of Black men. Upon seeing a group of a large African-American disposition, school identification is commonly requested at the doors to many frat houses. If the proper school ID is not provided, access to the party is many times denied. These schools have found that parties are often dampened by students from Morehouse.

Morehouse is a school that has a reputation about it. She produces the best graduates in the nation and ranks in the top 30 feeder schools in the world. The networking her students provide act as a safety net for Morehouse Men in Corporate America and graduate schools across the states. It is said that if you can succeed at Morehouse, you can succeed anywhere in the world.

We must fight to make sure that the efficiency we exhibit across the globe is the same efficiency that we exhibit across the campus. From providing adequate resources to the students, to adequate resources to professors, to adequate resources to staff. There needs to be equality in our services and a balance in our infrastructure. Everything in this school needs to work, not just our prestigious graduates.

I want to hear more stories about the groups of children who visit Brawley 100 every Saturday morning for tutoring. The volunteer program has been quite successful over time and the students seem to be rather enthusiastic about learning. When asking one of the tutors if the program happened every Saturday morning, he replies, “Nothing can stop the ‘House.”