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African American Tuition Valued At $64 Billion; But HBCUs Receive Less Than $6 Billion Annually

Posted on April 17, 2026 by | Leave a comment

HBCUs are more than just schools, they are a home. – Chadwick Boseman

The paradox is impossible to ignore: African American communities consistently champion the importance of buying Black and supporting Black-owned businesses, yet when it comes to what may be the largest purchase of a lifetime, a college education, the overwhelming majority of Black families choose to invest those dollars elsewhere. This decision has profound consequences for the survival and strength of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, institutions that remain pillars of Black achievement, economic mobility, and community power.

As of Spring 2025, approximately 19.4 million students are enrolled in U.S. colleges and universities, with about 15 million undergraduates and over 3 million graduate students, according to data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reported by NPR and BestColleges. This enrollment represents a recovery from pandemic-era declines, though numbers remain below 2010 peaks. African American students comprise roughly 13-15% of this total enrollment, representing approximately 2.5 to 2.9 million students across all institution types. When we calculate the economic value of these students based on current tuition rates, the numbers are staggering.

For the 2024-2025 academic year, public four-year institutions charge approximately $11,950 for in-state students and $31,880 for out-of-state students. Private nonprofit four-year schools average around $45,000 in tuition and fees. Public two-year colleges, which experienced a 3% enrollment increase in Fall 2024 according to USA Today reports, charge an average of $4,150 for in-district students. When you factor in room and board expenses, which averaged $13,310 for 2024-2025, the total cost of attendance reaches approximately $27,146 at public four-year institutions and $58,628 at private nonprofit four-year schools. Using a weighted average cost of attendance of approximately $26,000-$28,000 per year across all institution types, African American students and their families collectively spend approximately $64 billion annually on higher education. This represents enormous purchasing power—power that could transform Black institutions and communities if redirected strategically.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: of that $64 billion, African American students at HBCUs represent only about $6 billion in tuition revenue and that $6 billion is essentially all HBCUs have to work with. Unlike predominantly white institutions with massive endowments, substantial state funding, and robust donor bases, HBCUs are almost entirely tuition-dependent. This means that more than 90% of African American education dollars approximately $58 billion annually flow to institutions that were not built for us, by us, or with our advancement as their primary mission.

We talk extensively about supporting Black businesses, banking Black, and keeping dollars circulating in our communities. Yet when families sit down to make college decisions, often the single largest financial investment they will make outside of purchasing a home, the conversation shifts. Suddenly, the narrative becomes about rankings, prestige, resources, and opportunities at predominantly white institutions, while HBCUs are considered as backup options or dismissed entirely.

This pattern has devastating consequences. The approximately 222,300 African American students currently enrolled at HBCUs generate roughly $6 billion in tuition revenue and for most HBCUs, that tuition revenue represents the vast majority of their operating budgets. Unlike well-endowed predominantly white institutions that rely heavily on endowment returns, substantial state appropriations, federal research grants, and robust alumni giving, HBCUs are critically dependent on tuition dollars just to keep their doors open. When Black students choose to take their tuition dollars elsewhere, it directly threatens these institutions’ survival, limiting their ability to maintain programs, hire faculty, upgrade facilities, and provide student services.

The impact extends far beyond immediate operating budgets. Every student who chooses a predominantly white institution over an HBCU represents not just lost tuition revenue today, but lost philanthropic potential tomorrow. Alumni giving is the lifeblood of institutional endowments, and alumni tend to give most generously to the institutions they attended. When successful Black professionals graduate from predominantly white institutions, their alumni donations when they give at all flow back to those schools. Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and other elite institutions benefit from the success of Black graduates who might have attended HBCUs if those institutions had received even a fraction of the resources concentrated at the top of higher education’s hierarchy. Meanwhile, HBCU endowments remain comparatively microscopic, not because their graduates are less successful, but because there are fewer of them writing checks back to their alma maters.

This creates a vicious cycle. Smaller enrollment means less tuition revenue and for institutions operating almost entirely on tuition, this is an existential threat. Fewer graduates means smaller donor pools. Smaller donor pools mean smaller endowments. Smaller endowments mean even greater dependence on tuition revenue and less money for scholarships, facilities, and programs. Less competitive resources make it harder to attract students. And the cycle continues, generation after generation.

The wealth gap between HBCU endowments and those of predominantly white institutions is staggering and growing. Howard University recently became the first HBCU to cross the $1 billion endowment mark, a milestone that should be celebrated but instead highlights the crisis. The top 10 HBCU endowments combined total approximately $2.6 billion. Meanwhile, Harvard University’s endowment alone exceeds $50 billion, and the top 10 predominantly white institutions hold a combined $336 billion in endowments. The PWI-to-HBCU endowment gap stands at 129 to 1. Only one HBCU has an endowment over $1 billion, while 148 predominantly white institutions have endowments exceeding that mark. This disparity means that while HBCUs scrape by on tuition revenue with minimal endowment support, elite PWIs can offer generous financial aid packages funded by massive investment returns, making them appear more affordable even as they siphon Black student dollars away from Black institutions.

In barbershops and beauty salons, at family gatherings and community events, the conversation about economic empowerment is constant. We discuss the importance of circulation of Black dollars, the need to build generational wealth, and the imperative of supporting institutions that support us. Social media amplifies calls to buy Black, support Black-owned restaurants, use Black banks, and patronize Black professionals. Yet somehow, this collective consciousness evaporates when it’s time to choose a college. Parents who wouldn’t think twice about driving across town to support a Black-owned business will encourage their children to attend predominantly white institutions without seriously considering HBCU alternatives. Students who wear “support Black business” t-shirts apply exclusively to schools where they will be a small minority, where their history may be marginalized, and where their dollars will fund institutions with no historical commitment to Black advancement.

This isn’t about judgment these are rational decisions made by families trying to secure the best possible future for their children in a competitive world. The problem is that these individual rational choices, when aggregated, produce a collective outcome that weakens the very institutions most committed to Black success.

Consider what HBCUs accomplish with their fraction of African American education dollars. These institutions enroll approximately 10% of all African American college students but produce nearly 20% of Black graduates. They generate an even higher percentage of Black professionals in critical fields like engineering, medicine, and education. The majority of Black doctors, a disproportionate share of Black lawyers, and a significant portion of Black educators earned their degrees from HBCUs. HBCUs create environments where Black students see themselves in positions of leadership, where their history and culture are centered rather than marginalized, and where they build networks that last lifetimes. Research consistently shows that Black students at HBCUs report higher levels of engagement, stronger sense of belonging, and greater confidence in their abilities compared to Black students at predominantly white institutions.

They accomplish all of this while operating on budgets that would be considered inadequate at any predominantly white institution. They make miracles happen with limited resources, outdated facilities, and faculty salaries that make it difficult to compete for top talent. Imagine what they could do with just a fraction of that $64 billion currently flowing elsewhere.

The numbers tell a stark story. Approximately 292,500 students currently attend HBCUs, with African American students comprising about 76% of that enrollment roughly 222,300 Black students. At an average cost of attendance of $26,000-$28,000 annually, these students represent approximately $6 billion in tuition revenue flowing to HBCUs each year. Meanwhile, the remaining 2.3 to 2.7 million African American college students roughly 90% of all Black college students generate approximately $58 billion in tuition revenue for predominantly white institutions.

Think about that ratio: $6 billion staying in Black institutions versus $58 billion leaving them. This isn’t about equity or fairness this is about economic power and where we choose to deploy it. Every semester, Black families collectively make purchasing decisions that send nearly ten times more money to institutions with no historical commitment to Black advancement than to institutions that were literally built to educate us when no one else would.

The enrollment landscape is shifting. Spring 2025’s 19.4 million total enrollment shows growth in both undergraduate and graduate programs. Particularly significant is the 3% surge in community college enrollment in Fall 2024, suggesting that cost considerations are increasingly driving educational decisions. This cost consciousness presents an opportunity. As families become more aware of student debt burdens and question the return on investment of expensive predominantly white institutions, HBCUs offer compelling value propositions. But they can only compete if they have the resources to tell their stories effectively, maintain quality programs, and provide the support services today’s students expect.

The net price reality adds another dimension. While published tuition rates provide a baseline, actual costs after financial aid vary significantly, typically ranging from $17,000 to $25,000 depending on institution type. However, African American students often face higher net prices than their peers at the same institutions due to lower family wealth and less access to non-loan aid. This means Black families are stretching further financially, taking on more debt, and working more hours often to attend institutions with no particular commitment to Black student success.

The solution requires a fundamental shift in how we think about educational choices. White families don’t agonize over whether to “give HBCUs a chance” they automatically prioritize their own institutions. They attend state flagships, legacy schools where their parents and grandparents went, institutions that have accumulated centuries of wealth from their community’s investment. They don’t need to be convinced to support their own. Yet somehow, Black families have internalized a narrative that HBCUs are noble but limited, worth considering but not prioritizing, respectable but not prestigious. This is the mental colonization that costs us $58 billion annually.

We need to be as intentional about our education spending as we claim to be about supporting Black businesses. This means making HBCUs the default choice, not the backup plan. It means understanding that when white families send their children to their flagship state universities and legacy institutions, they’re not making a sacrifice they’re making an investment in institutional power that compounds over generations. Black families deserve the same mindset. The choice of where to spend education dollars is an economic decision with ramifications far beyond individual degree attainment. It’s about building institutional power that can withstand political and social headwinds.

Institutional strength matters. Strong HBCUs create jobs in Black communities, anchor local economies, generate Black wealth through employment and contracts, and serve as catalysts for community development. They provide platforms for Black intellectual leadership, preserve and advance Black culture, and create networks of mutual support that span generations and geographies. In an increasingly uncertain social and political environment, the importance of strong Black institutions becomes even more apparent. When external support proves unreliable, when political winds shift, when social progress reverses, communities need institutions they control and can depend on. HBCUs represent exactly that kind of institutional foundation.

The question isn’t whether HBCUs deserve support their track record speaks for itself. The question is whether African American families will align their spending decisions with their stated values around Black economic empowerment. That $64 billion represents power—power to build, strengthen, and sustain institutions that have proven their commitment to Black success. How we choose to deploy that power will determine whether HBCUs merely survive or truly thrive in the generations ahead.

The choice is ours. The power has always been ours. The question is whether we’ll use it.

Disclaimer: This article was assisted by ClaudeAI.

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The DEI Distraction: Why Black Business Leaders Are Defending the Wrong Battlefield

Posted on March 29, 2026 by | Leave a comment

It is simple. Our talent and capital is either empowering and enriching our institutional ecosystem – or it is doing that for someone else. We are begging Others’ to let our talent and capital make them richer and more powerful. – William A. Foster, IV

When Bloomberg Businessweek convened a roundtable of prominent Black business executives in late March 2026 to discuss the Trump administration’s sweeping rollback of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, the gathering carried an unmistakable weight. The participants — Ursula Burns of Integrum, Lisa Wardell of the American Express board, Jacob Walthour Jr. of Blueprint Capital Advisors, Nicole Reboe of Rich Talent Group, and Chris Williams of Siebert Williams Shank represent some of the most accomplished figures in American corporate life. Their concerns are real. Their frustrations are earned. And they are, with the greatest respect, focused on exactly the wrong problem.

The DEI debate has consumed enormous intellectual and political energy among Black business leadership. Executives like Burns have emphasized that DEI efforts historically helped address systemic barriers rather than provide unfair advantages. This is correct as far as it goes. But defending the legitimacy of DEI however righteous the argument is fundamentally an argument about access to other people’s institutions. It is a debate about whether African American talent will be permitted to generate wealth for corporate structures that it does not own, govern, or ultimately benefit from in proportion to its contribution. Winning that argument secures a seat at a table built by someone else, financed by someone else, and passed on to someone else’s heirs.

The more consequential question, one that the DEI debate reliably obscures is this: what is the strategic value of Black business ownership as the foundation of an autonomous African American institutional ecosystem, and why has that ecosystem remained so structurally underdeveloped compared to the scale of Black talent and labor flowing through the broader American economy?

The case against centering the DEI debate as the primary lens for Black economic advancement is, at its core, an argument about capital flows. Every dollar of Black labor and talent that enters a corporation it does not own produces returns that are retained, reinvested, and compounded within that corporation’s ownership structure. The wages extracted represent a fraction of the value created. This is not a critique unique to the experience of African Americans, it is the fundamental logic of capitalism. The distinction, however, is that other ethnic and national communities have historically used their productive capacity to capitalize their own institutional ecosystems: banks, insurance companies, real estate holding entities, research universities, and media operations that recirculate wealth within the community rather than exporting it.

Between 2017 and 2022, Black-owned employer businesses grew by nearly 57 percent, adding more than 70,000 new firms, injecting $212 billion into the economy and paying over $61 billion in salaries. That is not a trivial contribution. But its structural limitations are equally stark. Black Americans make up 14 percent of the U.S. population but own only 3.3 percent of businesses. More revealing still: if Black business ownership continues to grow at its current rate of 4.72 percent annually, it will take 256 years to reach parity with the share of Black people in America, a timeline that leaves racial wealth gaps entrenched across generations. No DEI program, however well-designed or vigorously defended, addresses that structural gap. DEI operates within the existing distribution of institutional ownership. It does not alter it. A Black executive ascending to the C-suite of a Fortune 500 company is a personal achievement of consequence, but it does not transfer a dollar of equity to the African American institutional ecosystem. The corporation retains its ownership structure, its compounding endowment, and its ability to extend opportunity to subsequent generations on its own terms.

This is not an argument that employment in major corporations is without value. It is an argument about strategic priority and institutional logic. The Bloomberg roundtable reflects the perspective of individuals who have navigated the highest levels of American corporate life with exceptional skill. But the very fact that their primary public posture is a defense of DEI — a program designed to manage the terms of Black participation in institutions owned by others — illustrates how thoroughly that framework has captured the strategic imagination of Black business leadership. White workers overall still hold 71 percent of executive jobs, 61 percent of manager positions, and 54 percent of professional roles. DEI, at its most effective, redistributed a fraction of corporate leadership positions without altering the underlying structure of institutional ownership. The wealth generated by those institutions through equity appreciation, retained earnings, and compounding investment portfolios continued to flow overwhelmingly to the same ownership class it always has.

The parallel structure that could generate equivalent wealth retention within the African American community requires not better access to existing institutions but the construction and capitalization of independent ones. HBCUs represent the most significant existing node in that potential ecosystem. They are anchor institutions with land assets, research capacity, and the ability to concentrate and retain Black talent. But they remain chronically undercapitalized relative to their peer institutions, in large part because the most financially productive graduates of HBCUs and of Black communities broadly are systematically routed into corporations and financial institutions that extract rather than recirculate their productive capacity.

Black households have, on average, 77 percent less wealth than white households — roughly $958,000 less per household, representing approximately 24 cents for every dollar of white family wealth. That gap is not primarily explained by differences in income or educational attainment. It is explained by differences in asset ownership, intergenerational wealth transfer, and institutional investment. The DEI framework, even at its most ambitious, addresses income. It does not address assets. If the share of Black employer businesses reached parity with the share of the Black population, cities across the country could see as many as 757,000 new businesses, 6.3 million more jobs, and an additional $824 billion in revenue circulating in local economies. That figure represents the economic magnitude of the ownership gap and none of it is captured by diversity metrics in corporate hiring. The structural barriers to closing that gap are not primarily political. They are financial. On average, 35 percent of white business owners received all the financing they applied for, compared to 16 percent of Black business owners. Black entrepreneurs are nearly three times more likely than white entrepreneurs to have business growth and profitability negatively impacted by a lack of financial capital, and 70.6 percent rely on personal and family savings for financing which means that lower household wealth creates a compounding disadvantage that no corporate diversity initiative is designed to resolve. This is the architecture of the problem: insufficient institutional wealth produces insufficient capital formation, which constrains business ownership, which perpetuates insufficient institutional wealth. DEI does not break that cycle because it operates entirely outside of it.

The African American institutional ecosystem: HBCUs and their endowments, African American owned banks and credit unions, Black-owned insurance and real estate entities, and community development financial institutions represents the structural alternative to the DEI framework. It is not a consolation prize for those excluded from mainstream corporate life. It is the only mechanism capable of generating the compounding institutional wealth that produces genuine economic sovereignty. HBCUs enroll approximately 10 percent of Black college students while producing a disproportionate share of Black professionals in STEM, law, medicine, and business. They hold land assets in some of the most economically dynamic metros in the South. They maintain alumni networks that, if systematically directed toward institutional investment rather than individual career advancement, could generate endowment growth and enterprise development at a scale currently untapped. The strategic argument is straightforward: every Black student who graduates from an HBCU and subsequently directs their career, capital, and philanthropic energy toward institutions within the aforementioned African American ecosystem compounds the institutional wealth available to the next generation. Every Black student who takes that same talent into a corporation it does not own, however successfully, contributes to the wealth of an institution that will not reciprocate at the ecosystem level.

This is not an argument for economic separatism. It is an argument for institutional density, the same logic that has guided the development of Jewish philanthropic networks, Korean rotating credit associations, and the university endowment strategies of the Ivy League. Strong communities maintain reinforcing networks of institutions that recirculate capital and concentrate talent. The DEI framework asks Black Americans to enrich other communities’ institutional networks on the condition of fairer treatment. The ownership framework asks Black Americans to build their own.

None of this is to diminish the real harm caused by the current administration’s DEI rollbacks. Black-owned businesses that relied on federal contracting set-asides have seen immediate, concrete losses with some small business owners reporting the loss of $15,000 to $20,000 per month due to reduced contract flows. The SBA admitted only 65 companies to its 8(a) business development program in 2025, compared with more than 2,000 admissions over the previous four years. These are real economic injuries that warrant legal and political challenge. But the defensive posture of protecting DEI within institutions that Black America does not control is insufficient as a long-term economic strategy. The Bloomberg roundtable produced eloquent testimony about the frustrations of Black executives navigating a hostile political environment. It produced very little discussion of what autonomous Black institutional infrastructure should look like, or how the talent assembled in that room of capital allocators, board directors, investment bankers, and talent executives might direct its resources toward building it.

The transition from a DEI-centered to an ownership-centered strategic framework requires institutional coordination that does not yet exist at scale. It requires HBCU endowments to function as patient capital for Black enterprise ecosystems rather than passive investment portfolios. It requires Black-owned financial institutions to be capitalized and connected to the deal flow generated by Black corporate executives. It requires alumni networks to function as economic infrastructure rather than social affinity groups. And it requires Black business leadership to measure its success not by representation metrics within institutions it does not own, but by the growth of institutional assets within the ecosystem it does. The DEI debate is real and the rollback is damaging. But the strategic imagination of Black business leadership will remain constrained so long as its primary horizon is defined by the terms of inclusion offered by others. The more consequential work — slower, less visible, and politically unrewarded — is the construction of institutions powerful enough that the terms of inclusion become irrelevant. That is the work HBCUs and the broader African American institutional ecosystem exist to support. It is the work that this moment demands.

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From Hillman to the World: How Whitley Gilbert-Wayne Built a Pan-African Art Empire

Posted on February 27, 2026 by | Leave a comment

You can go to school anyplace, but no school will love you, and teach you to love yourself and know yourself like Hillman. – Whitley Gilbert

When Whitley Gilbert-Wayne stepped off the plane in Tokyo alongside her husband Dwayne in the mid-1990s, she had no idea that a chance encounter at a contemporary art exhibition would transform her from a newlywed supporting her engineer husband’s career into one of the most influential voices in Pan-African art acquisition and investment. The former Hillman College art history major known during her undergraduate years for her impeccable style and occasional elitism had matured into a woman with vision that extended far beyond Virginia’s borders. What began as casual gallery visits in Tokyo’s vibrant Roppongi district evolved into a business idea that would eventually connect HBCU endowments, Black corporate America, and emerging artists across the African diaspora.

“I was standing in front of a piece by a Nigerian artist at this small gallery in Harajuku,” Whitley recalls of the moment that changed everything. “The gallery owner mentioned that wealthy Japanese collectors were increasingly investing in African contemporary art, and I realized if they see the value, why aren’t we, as African Americans, building these collections ourselves?” That revelation led Whitley to spend her remaining months in Japan studying the mechanics of art acquisition, investment, and appraisal. She networked with gallery owners, attended auctions, and built relationships with African artists who were making waves in Asia’s art markets. By the time she and Dwayne returned to the United States, she had a business plan, a network of artist contacts spanning three continents, and an unshakeable conviction that Black institutions and families deserved access to culturally relevant art investment opportunities.

Whitley’s first pitch wasn’t to venture capitalists or traditional investors, it was to her Hillman College alumni network. She reached out to former classmates who had established themselves in various industries: Dr. Kimberly Reese and Ron Johnson, the power couple behind the thriving Reese and Johnson Medical Group, Freddie Brooks in entertainment law, and even her college frenemy, Julian Pace, who had made his fortune in tech. “Whitley understood something fundamental,” says Ron Johnson, one of the fund’s founding investors. “She knew that we trusted each other because of our Hillman connection. She wasn’t asking us to just invest in art, she was asking us to invest in our cultural legacy.”

Dr. Kimberly Reese adds, “Ron and I had just completed our first major expansion of the medical group. We were looking for investment opportunities that aligned with our values. When Whitley presented her vision, it was clear this was about more than financial returns, it was about cultural preservation and long-term wealth building for our community.”

The Diaspora Art Investment Fund launched with $500,000 in seed capital from twenty Hillman alumni investors. Whitley’s model was revolutionary in its simplicity: identify emerging and mid-career artists from across the African diaspora from Salvador to Senegal, from Detroit to Durban acquire their works at fair market value, and create investment portfolios that would appreciate while supporting artists directly. Unlike traditional art investment funds that focused solely on returns, Whitley built in a mission-driven component. Ten percent of all profits would be reinvested in arts education programs at HBCUs and Historically Black Boarding Schools, creating a sustainable cycle of cultural wealth building.

Whitley’s most innovative contribution came when she approached her alma mater with an unconventional proposal: What if Hillman College built an art collection as part of its endowment strategy? “Most HBCUs had art on their walls, but it was rarely viewed as an asset class,” explains Dr. Terrence Mathis, Hillman’s Vice President for Advancement. “Whitley showed us that institutions like Yale and Harvard had art holdings worth hundreds of millions. She asked us why Hillman shouldn’t be acquiring works by contemporary Black artists that would appreciate in value while beautifying our campus and inspiring our students.”

Her consulting model for HBCUs was comprehensive. She would assess their existing collections, identify acquisition opportunities aligned with their budgets, negotiate directly with artists and galleries, handle authentication and appraisal, and develop exhibition strategies for campus galleries. Most importantly, she created educational programming that helped students understand art as both cultural expression and financial asset. Within five years, Whitley had consulted with fifteen HBCUs, helping them establish formal art acquisition programs. Texas College, Fisk University, and Savannah State University became early adopters, each building collections that now include works by Kehinde Wiley, Mickalene Thomas, and Wangechi Mutu—pieces that have appreciated significantly in value.

While institutional clients provided prestige, Whitley never forgot that wealth-building needed to extend to individual families. She developed a tiered service model specifically for HBCU alumni families who wanted to begin collecting art but didn’t know where to start. For clients with modest budgets, she offered educational workshops and access to emerging artists whose works started at $2,000-$5,000. For established collectors, she provided comprehensive acquisition services, including attendance at international art fairs, private viewings, and direct studio visits with prominent artists. “Whitley demystified art collecting for people like me,” says Kendra Williams, a North Carolina Central University alumna and corporate attorney. “I thought you needed to be a millionaire to collect meaningful art. She showed me that you could start small, build strategically, and create something beautiful and valuable for your family.” Her family services division has helped over 300 HBCU alumni families build personal collections, with many clients reporting that their acquisitions have tripled in value while providing immeasurable cultural enrichment to their homes.

Among her most enthusiastic clients are Kim and Ron themselves, who have used Whitley’s guidance to build an impressive collection for the Reese and Johnson Medical Group’s multiple locations. “Our patients commented immediately,” Dr. Reese notes. “Seeing artists who look like them, telling stories from our communities it changed the atmosphere of our practice entirely.” Whitley’s highest-profile work came through her corporate art advisory services. As Black-owned businesses expanded and Black executives ascended to C-suite positions across our own corporate African America, many began questioning why their physical spaces didn’t reflect the excellence and cultural richness of the people leading them. “Black CEOs and business owners would call me and say, ‘I just bought this building’ or ‘We’re opening our third location, and I refuse to have my walls look like every other corporate office,'” Whitley explains. “They wanted spaces that celebrated our heritage, that told our stories, that reminded their teams daily of the beauty and brilliance we come from.” Her corporate practice became a who’s who of Black entrepreneurial success from tech startups founded by young Morris College graduates to established manufacturing companies run by second and third-generation business owners. The Reese and Johnson Medical Group became one of her signature projects, transforming their practice locations into galleries that honored African and African American artistic traditions while creating healing, affirming spaces for their patients. As a corporate art broker and adviser, Whitley oversaw complete collection development for these companies, negotiating favorable terms, managing authentication, and ensuring proper insurance and conservation. Her approach combined aesthetic excellence with cultural competency, ensuring that corporate collections reflected the vision and values of Black leadership. “Working with the Reese and Johnson Medical Group was particularly meaningful,” Whitley says. “Here were two of my Hillman classmates who had built this incredible healthcare empire, and they wanted their spaces to reflect the excellence and beauty of Black culture. We curated pieces that spoke to healing, community, and resilience—themes that aligned perfectly with their mission.”

Perhaps Whitley’s most enduring legacy is the Pan-African Art Appraisal joint program she helped establish between Hillman College and the University of Namibia’s Department of Visual and Performing Arts. “Whitley recognized that the art world had a credibility problem when it came to valuing African and diaspora art,” notes Dr. Amara Okafor, program director at UNAM. “Too often, African art was undervalued or misunderstood by appraisers who lacked cultural context. She wanted to train a new generation of appraisers who understood both the technical aspects of valuation and the cultural significance of the works.” The program allows students to split their studies between Hillman’s art history department and UNAM’s Visual and Performing Arts department. Students gain hands-on experience with contemporary African art production, learn from artists addressing social issues through their work, and participate in exhibitions at the National Art Gallery of Namibia. Graduates of the program have gone on to work at major auction houses, establish their own galleries, and serve as in-house appraisers for museums and corporate collections. The program has become a model for other international partnerships, proving that HBCUs can lead in global arts education. The Reese and Johnson Medical Group has become a major supporter of the program, endowing two full scholarships annually for students pursuing careers in art appraisal and healthcare art therapy, a perfect synthesis of the couple’s medical expertise and their passion for the arts.

Today, Whitley maintains offices in New York and Johannesburg, traveling regularly between the continents she’s connected through art. The Diaspora Art Investment Fund manages over $50 million in assets, her consulting firm has worked with thirty HBCUs, and the Hillman-UNAM program graduates twenty-five students annually. But perhaps most telling is her personal collection, which she and Dwayne have assembled over the years. It includes works from artists they discovered in Tokyo decades ago, pieces by Hillman alumni artists, and acquisitions from UNAM student exhibitions. The collection represents not just financial investment, but relationships, memories, and a commitment to the vision that first struck her in that Tokyo gallery.

“I tell young people that building cultural wealth isn’t just about money,” Whitley reflects. “It’s about creating infrastructure, establishing standards, and ensuring that our stories, our beauty, and our creativity are valued literally and figuratively. That’s what I learned at Hillman, and that’s what I’m trying to build for the next generation.” From a student who once measured success by designer labels and social status, Whitley Gilbert-Wayne has become an entrepreneur who measures impact by artists supported, institutions strengthened, and communities empowered. It’s a transformation worthy of the art she champions and one that continues to inspire her fellow Hillman alumni, from the Reese and Johnson Medical Group to boardrooms and galleries across the diaspora.

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HBCU Money’s 2025 Top 10 HBCU Endowments

Posted on February 17, 2026 by | Leave a comment

Note: These data are based on colleges, universities, affiliated foundations, and related nonprofit organizations that volunteered to participate in NACUBO’s endowment study series.

A year after Howard University became the first HBCU to break the $1 billion endowment value mark, four other HBCUs have reached the $100 million mark. It is a complicated celebration when the NACUBO report shows 89 PWIs who have at least $2 billion in endowment value. A few notable HBCUs who reported last year like Morehouse College, North Carolina A&T and Meharry Medical College who have been regular NACUBO participants, are all absent from this year’s list. An HBCU favorite, the University of Virgin Islands returned after an absence in 2024. The reality on the ground with the looming crisis in admissions is for most HBCUs, $500 million is the endowment floor and only two HBCUs (Howard and Spelman) are above that mark. With not as many students graduating K-12, that means HBCUs who are heavily reliant on tuition revenue will see acute strains in the coming decade. It is not a matter of if, but when. Strong endowments are often the only thing that can see institutions through times of stress. That currently includes political stress that all colleges and universities are facing as it relates to state and federal funding. The lack of urgency among HBCU alumni continues to be concerning. Many HBCU alumni think their institution is in better financial shape than it is with no real landscape of higher education economics and the factors that create vulnerability. Using HBCU Alumni Associations and Chapters as more aggressive investment vehicles that can benefit an HBCU’s foundation and endowment are paramount to long-term stability. But this means seeing them as more than social clubs. HBCUs like all African American institutions are in perilous times and continued reliance on lottery philanthropy that may or may not come from non-alumni driven philanthropy (see Mackenzie Scott, Michael Bloomberg, etc.) is as dangerous as hoping to pay your bills every month with scratch off lottery tickets.

NACUBO Press Release:

“This year’s report shows how important well-managed endowments are to colleges and universities,” said Kara D. Freeman, NACUBO President and CEO. “Endowments help fuel innovation and serve as a stable foundation for institutions. Because of challenges in the economy, some institutions relied more heavily on their endowments—but that additional spending benefited students, faculty, staff, research, operations, and more. Endowments make college possible and more affordable, and contribute to better lives for all.”

NACUBO HIGHLIGHTS:

  • Top 10 HBCU Endowment Total – $2.4 billion*
  • Top 10 PWI Endowment Total – $340.0 billion
  • Number of PWIs Above $2 billion – 89
  • Number of PWIs Above $1 billion – 169
  • Number of HBCUs Above $1 billion – 1
  • Number of HBCUs Above $100 million – 4*
  • 678 colleges, universities, and education-related foundations completed NACUBO’s FY25 survey and those institutions hold $953.7 billion of endowment assets with an average endowment of $1.4 billion and median endowment of $259.9 million.
  • HBCUs comprised 1.4 percent of NACUBO’s reporting institutions and 0.3 percent of the reporting endowment assets.
  • PWI endowments (32) with endowments over $5 billion hold 57.4 percent of the $953.7 billion in endowment assets.

**The change in market value does NOT represent the rate of return for the institution’s investments. Rather, the change in the market value of an endowment from FY24 to FY25 reflects the net impact of:
1) withdrawals to fund institutional operations and capital expenses;
2) the payment of endowment management and investment fees;
3) additions from donor gifts and other contributions; and
4) investment gains or losses.

SOURCE: NACUBO

Take a look at how an endowment works. Not only scholarships to reduce the student debt burden but research, recruiting talented faculty & students, faculty salaries, and a host of other things can be paid for through a strong endowment. It ultimately is the lifeblood of a college or university to ensure its success generation after generation.

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Pan-African Donor-Advised Funds: A Blueprint For African American Financial Institutions

Posted on January 30, 2026 by | Leave a comment

“To be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships.” — W.E.B. Du Bois

Philanthropy, at its best, is not only about generosity but also about power. For African America and the broader African Diaspora, philanthropy has too often been reduced to the goodwill of outsider corporations, foundations, and billionaires whose dollars arrive with priorities and strings attached. If African American financial institutions are to play a central role in reshaping the destiny of our people, they must learn to wield the tools of modern philanthropy at scale. Chief among these tools is the donor-advised fund.

A donor-advised fund, or DAF, is a charitable giving vehicle hosted by a sponsoring public charity. Donors contribute assets such as cash, securities, or real estate, receive an immediate tax deduction, and then recommend grants to nonprofit organizations over time. These funds are often described as “charitable investment accounts,” because once assets are placed inside them they can be invested for tax-free growth, providing donors the flexibility to make grants years or even decades later. Unlike private foundations, DAFs do not carry heavy administrative costs, reporting requirements, or annual payout mandates. That combination of flexibility, efficiency, and tax benefit has made them the fastest-growing vehicle in philanthropy, with more than $229 billion in assets managed in the United States by 2022.

The technical mechanics are straightforward, but the implications for African American institutional power are profound. When majority institutions host DAFs, they not only manage the assets and collect the fees but also strengthen their institutional position in the broader philanthropic ecosystem. If African American banks, credit unions, and HBCUs were to host their own DAF platforms, they would retain both the capital and the influence. They would also ensure that those assets circulate internally, building the capacity of Black institutions rather than reinforcing external ones.

The Pan-African case for donor-advised funds grows out of both history and strategy. The African Diaspora is scattered across North America, the Caribbean, South America, Europe, and Africa. Despite cultural variations, there is a shared experience of enslavement, colonization, and systemic exclusion that has left us fragmented and underdeveloped institutionally. A Pan-African DAF would allow African America’s wealth to pool with Diasporic wealth, creating a philanthropic capital base that could fund initiatives from Harlem to Havana, from Lagos to London. Imagine a Spelman alumna in Atlanta, a banker in Kingston, and a tech entrepreneur in Nairobi all contributing to the same Pan-African DAF. The fund’s assets grow through coordinated investment, and the grants sustain HBCUs, African universities, Diaspora think tanks, hospitals, and cooperative businesses. Philanthropy would move beyond sporadic generosity into a coordinated, long-term Diasporic strategy.

African American financial institutions are uniquely positioned to lead in building these vehicles. Black-owned banks could create DAF platforms, allowing depositors and wealthier clients to establish accounts, with the bank managing the assets and directing grants into curated pools of African American and Diaspora institutions. HBCUs could build DAFs under their endowment arms, offering alumni the chance to contribute not just to individual schools but to collective vehicles that support Black higher education broadly. Credit unions, already rooted in cooperative traditions, could create member-based DAFs that channel contributions into scholarships, healthcare clinics, or Diaspora research projects. A Pan-African exchange could even emerge, allowing African American donors to support African institutions and African donors to support African American initiatives, breaking down silos and creating reciprocity.

The impact on philanthropy would be transformative. Pooling resources through Pan-African DAFs would reduce fragmentation and administrative waste. A single DAF with $1 billion in assets could deploy $50 million in annual grants while continuing to grow its capital base. Instead of thousands of scattered donations, these funds would strategically target long-term capacity-building institutions like universities, hospitals, and think tanks. They would also allow families to pass advisory privileges to children and grandchildren, embedding intergenerational philanthropy into family legacies. By linking U.S. tax benefits with Diaspora impact, Pan-African DAFs would connect global Black institutions across borders in ways never before achieved.

More than philanthropy, DAFs are about institutional power. Hosting our own funds would allow African America to retain capital that otherwise circulates through majority institutions. The act of managing billions in philanthropic assets would increase the legitimacy, visibility, and bargaining power of African American banks and credit unions in the national financial system. Control over DAFs also allows agenda-setting: funding HBCU graduate schools, African healthcare systems, Diaspora media, or land ownership initiatives. With sufficient scale, Pan-African DAFs would fund the think tanks, advocacy networks, and policy shops that shape legislation and strategy across the Diaspora. They would also strengthen interdependence between Black banks, universities, and cooperatives, weaving a tighter institutional ecosystem. And globally, they would reframe African American philanthropy as not merely domestic but as a force shaping development across Africa, the Caribbean, and beyond.

Mainstream philanthropic firms offer lessons. Fidelity Charitable, Schwab Charitable, and Vanguard Charitable collectively manage tens of billions in DAF assets, attracting donors with ease of use, professional management, and trusted brands. But they also embody the critique that DAFs can warehouse wealth indefinitely, giving donors immediate tax deductions without ensuring timely disbursement to communities. A Pan-African DAF must avoid this trap by committing to clear disbursement expectations, perhaps requiring annual grantmaking of 7 to 10 percent of assets. It must also invest in building trust and branding. Fidelity and Schwab are household names; African American financial institutions must cultivate similar reputations for professionalism, security, and vision if they are to attract donors at scale.

The roadmap to implementation is straightforward. Institutions must establish DAFs under existing nonprofit or financial arms with full compliance to IRS rules. They must develop Pan-African investment strategies that allocate assets into African American-owned funds, African sovereign bonds, and Diasporic infrastructure projects. They need technology platforms that allow donors to open accounts, contribute assets, recommend grants, and track impact with ease. Partnerships with vetted institutions across the Diaspora are essential, ensuring that grants reach trusted universities, hospitals, and cooperatives. Above all, a compelling public narrative must frame participation in Pan-African DAFs as not just philanthropy but as an act of liberation and institution building. Families should be encouraged to use DAFs to teach the next generation about philanthropy and responsibility, embedding giving as a permanent part of Diasporic culture.

The vision for the future is clear. By 2045, African American banks could be managing $100 billion in Pan-African DAFs, with $7–10 billion flowing annually into HBCUs, African universities, hospitals, and think tanks. Fee revenues from managing these assets would sustain our financial institutions, while the grants would expand the capacity of Diasporic institutions. The Pan-African DAF could become one of the most powerful philanthropic vehicles in the world, rivaling Gates, Ford, and Rockefeller. But unlike those entities, it would not be rooted in charity; it would be rooted in sovereignty. It would represent a Diaspora using philanthropy to build freedom, not dependency.

Donor-advised funds are not new, but their potential for African American and Pan-African institutions has yet to be realized. For too long, our wealth has flowed outward, strengthening others’ institutions while leaving ours fragile. By developing Pan-African DAFs, African American banks, credit unions, and HBCUs can capture that wealth, grow it, and deploy it across the Diaspora to increase our power. This is not simply about philanthropy; it is about sovereignty, agenda-setting, and survival. The next century will not be decided by who receives charity but by who controls the institutions that give it.

Disclaimer: This article was assisted by ChatGPT

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