St. Augustine’s University, a historically Black institution in North Carolina, has become the first to express interest in joining President Donald Trump’s Higher Education Compact, despite the initiative being rejected by numerous prestigious universities including Ivy League schools. The administration’s proposal, linked to preferential federal funding, includes restrictions on race-based admissions and a tuition freeze, which have generated apprehensions among HBCUs like St. Augustine’s University. The union’s representatives, in their letter to the Trump administration, have acknowledged some of the challenges an HBC, may face in joining the compact, particularly around the restricts on race-based admissions and the tuition freeze.
The compact, which is tied to preferential federal funding for universities that participate, explicitly bars consideration of race, ethnicity and other identity-based characteristics for admissions and scholarship decisions, an obvious potential hurdle for a historically Black school. The letter also notes that the compact’s tuition freeze, which says schools joining the compact cannot raise tuition for five years after signing, could be a significant hurdle to clear, given that HBCUs often have smaller endowments than private schools and large state universities. Another concern for the school is whether the compact, which forbids DEI programs and caps foreign admissions to 15% of the student population and 5% from any single nation, will be compatible with the compact, noting the school’s