IUB coordinates return to Black Expo

The IU-Bloomington campus will return next week to the 2001 Indiana Black Expo to showcase the University and promote the importance of higher education.\nIU-Bloomington joins the other IU campuses in promoting the educational opportunities it provides African Americans and others by emphasizing the importance of a college education. The week-long celebration will run from July 16-22 at the Indiana Convention Center and RCA Dome in Indianapolis.\n"This is the single largest presence Indiana University has ever had at Indiana Black Expo, and it is a coordinated, university-wide effort," IU vice president for student development and diversity Charlie Nelms said in a statement.\n"This is just a part of our renewed commitment to communicate with the citizens of Indiana about the value of education and the role IU can play. Beyond Indiana Black Expo, we want these students to visit out campuses and experience them for themselves."\nIUPUI and each of the other IU campuses will have large exhibits showcasing programs that highlight the university's tradition of providing educational opportunities for all people and its commitment to diversity, according to a University press release. Among the program's featured will be IU's Afro-American Studies program, the African American Cultural Center, the African Arts Institute and other programs catered toward students of other ethnic heritages.\n"The large eye-catching booths (for IU and IUPUI) will be located adjacent from one another and will feature interactive, hands-on exhibits designed to attract lots of young people," associate director of admissions Larry Gonzalez said.\nThough IU will gear its promotion toward pre-college students, Indiana Black Expo is intended to draw people of all ages nationwide representing several ethnic backgrounds.\n"Black Expo has families coming from all across the United States. We want them to consider Indiana University when they consider high-quality, minority-sensitive and supportive institutions for their sons and daughters," Frank Motley, IU associate chancellor for academic support and diversity, said.\nA key goal of next week's IBE will be to attract younger students to the exhibits, in order to alert them of the many pre-college programs IU offers as well as get them thinking about planning for college.\nIU officials want these students to realize that a college education is an attainable goal.\n"One of the things that we want to communicate to young people is that education is possible, an Indiana University education is possible, and here is what it's going to take in order for you to be successful at a post-secondary educational institution, be that IU or anywhere else," Nelms said.