HBCU's & the IMU

Feel like you're missing out on the whole Historically Black College or University experience you saw on the hit Cosby-spinoff "A Different World?"\nIt's OK. I did, too. \nThen I learned a trick. And I was able to mentally transport myself to Hillman College. Quite literally, I could see the light reflecting off Dwayne Wayne's flip-up shades. \nHere's how it works: \nTuesday, go to the Indiana Memorial Union around noon or 12:30 (midweek gets the best results). Maintaining a swift pace, head east through the mezzanine level. When the smell of breadsticks hits you, start jogging. \nAs you see tables appearing just ahead in your peripheral vision, sprint! \nAs you pass the first pillar (the one near the trash can), turn your head as fast as you can, then whip it back to its original position before you can actually look beyond the first few tables of sistas and brothas. \nSlow down once you run into the "bank line" at Burger King. Stretch your calves. Turn around, regain your speed and repeat the process -- in the opposite direction of course.\nThe first time I did this little trick, I seriously thought I was dining at the Pit. I could see a concentration of brown folks. I could smell Mr. Gaines' french fries. \nJust astounding.\nYou laugh now, but when being the only black person in history class starts getting to you -- even the illusion of feeling like a "non-minority" can present some relief.\nIn my opinion, outside an Afro-Studies class, a Neal-Marshall or black Greek-lettered organization-sponsored event and the Atkins Learning Center, the IMU Marketplace puts up stiff competition for the title of "most well-known concentration of black folks."\n"B.E.T." (Black Eating Time), is how a writer for Honey magazine described a similar situation at the University of Virginia, where black students make up about 10 percent of the undergrad population and exhibit dining habits similar to those of black folks at IU. \nThe phenomena's enough to make you wanna read "Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria."\nSome would call it "self-segregation." The book's author, Dr. Beverly Tatum, calls it "balkanization."\nIn a CNN report, Tatum describes the phenomena among high schoolers as a tendency to "start looking for people with similar experience, similar backgrounds to them."\nBut, whoa -- my peers and I are newly designated grown folks. And by now have, for the most part, laid the foundation for our identity.\nSo why are all the black kids still sitting together in the IMU Marketplace?\nNot because we've been secretly forced to, but because it's easier to find someone who can understand the significance of going "natural."\nAnd more importantly, because memories of being the singular black person at freshman orientation can leave emotional scars -- enough to compel any black person to seek out other black students like the fate of sister and brotherhood hang in the balance. \nMy homeboy Chris, who attends Howard University in Washington, D.C., says he'd never trade in his HBCU-experience. And I can understand why -- because of the culture, and more importantly, the community. \nNot to mention the allure of strolling beside poetic sistas donning Angela Davis T-shirts under lab coats and the daily fraternization with briefcased brothas sporting cowrie shells on six-inch 'locs.'\nI'm missing out on all that. But I made a conscious decision to attend IU.\nSo I plan to use all I learn in and out of the classroom to make my mark on the world.\nBecause in the end, it's not about what table you sat at -- it's about what you did after you got up.