WOMAN: How are you?

Good to see you.

STUDENT: Thank you.

DAVID WILSON: "A National Treasure."

STUDENT: Yes.

DAVID: "Since 1867."

STUDENT: Mm-hm.

DAVID: Now turn around let's get this picture.

STUDENT: Alright.

PHOTOGRAPHER: Pull it in tight, lean in for me.

DAVID: Now this says it all, "The National Treasure Since 1867."

MAN 2: Oh I love it, I love that.

DAVID: We are not confused here, Morgan.

And you can see that our students are not confused, they know a national treasure when they see it.

(laughter).

MAN 2: National Treasure is not a nickname, it's a designation, an official national designation.

And we're the only one in the whole nation.

♪ ♪ BRYANT BEMO BROWN: Welcome to HBCU week from the campus of Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland I am your cultural analyst and correspondent, Bryant "BeMo" Brown.

This special presentation lays up all of what you can expect to see for HBCU week on Maryland Public Television.

The daily lineups for this year are scintillating folks!

We'll get to more of that shortly.

In the meantime, let's travel to Morgan State ya'll, we got the president of Morgan State guiding freshmen to their classes, look at that fist pump, riveting conversations, and even a sneak peek into the Bearcade at the Student Center.

Let's get to it.

For centuries, Historically Black Colleges and Universities have been building a legacy of equitable and attainable education for its students, an education that doesn't stop at the archways of the classroom or even at the confirmation of a degree.

See, the HBCU experience is so much more rich than just the college experience.

Today we're on the campus of Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland, we're gonna have a special conversation between Tetiana Anderson and the president, Dr.

Wilson.

I'm about to go and talk to a couple of students to see if we can't investigate, what makes the HBCU experience, the Morgan State Bear experience, much more than just academic accolades.

I am your cultural correspondent, Bryant "BeMo" Brown, this is HBCU week.

Come with me ya'll, let's take a trip.

I'm here with my man Tyler, Tyler, how you doin' today man?

TYLER MITCHELL: I'm doing perfect, how 'bout yourself?

BEMO: I'm doing pretty good, Tyler.

Tyler, give me your HBCU intro if you will.

TYLER: Hello, my name is Tyler Mitchell, I'm a political science major and I am a junior and I was born and raised in the Baltimore City.

BEMO: So Tyler, I have to ask you a very important question first.

TYLER: Of course.

BEMO: Why did you choose Morgan State?

TYLER: Oh, yes, that's a brilliant question, for one, it's close by, I was, you know, born and raised at Sinai Hospital.

BEMO: Right.

TYLER: And so that's about 20-30 minutes around, um, and two, this was my first choice because Morgan is a perfect networking school.

A lot of people don't really realize this because they're busy living the college life, and that's not bad, but you have to realize, these are gonna be your coworkers, these are gonna be your networks in the future.

BEMO: Yeah.

TYLER: And so when you talk to people you have to make sure you are making a connection, not just a connection for now but a connection for the future.

BEMO: Absolutely.

TYLER: And so you've got to make a good impression.

BEMO: I like that, I like that.

I'm, I'm looking at your shirt right now and it says, "My HBCU prepared me for the real world."

I heard your President, Dr.

Wilson say, that one of his goals as president is to make sure students have confidence going into the real world, how have you experienced that confidence here at Morgan State?

TYLER: Oh absolutely, there's something the late Elijah Cummings had said.

BEMO: Tell me.

TYLER: And that is, "To have confidence in your competence."

And this has taught me that competence really lies in how you approach information.

BEMO: Right.

TYLER: So when you read a book you have to make sure that you are actually reading it for one and that you can find something interesting about it.

You know, a lot of students and, me included, can struggle at finding something interesting.

BEMO: Ok, ok.

TYLER: And so you have to put yourself in a scenario if you need to, you know, role play, I love D&D, so uh, role play doing something, role play having a reason to learn something and it makes it much more easier to enjoy the work and to find ways to apply it.

BEMO: Right.

TYLER: And so that's my strategy.

BEMO: Ok, ok, tell me about the diversity at a HBCU, I think when people think HBCUs, it's just Black, all Black, everybody watching "Friday," fried chicken on Wednesdays.

Tell me about the diversity that happens at a place like Morgan State.

TYLER: Oh, there's plenty of diversity.

I know White people, I know Asians, Indians, so make sure you don't fall in a colorism because um, you know, a lot of people can fall into the, the echo chamber of, "I only want Black people at an HBCU."

BEMO: Ok, ok.

TYLER: And um, this can make it very difficult to have other people want to go to a HBCU.

BEMO: Right.

TYLER: And I've met brilliant people of multiple different shades here and so we have to make sure not to fall to the kinds of oppression in which have been initiated on to us.

BEMO: I love that.

Tyler, I appreciate you, thank you for coming to Morgan.

TYLER: Of course, thank you so much.

BEMO: We'll be right back with more HBCU week.

STUDENT: Why don't you go ahead throw up a peace sign?

STUDENT 2: Oh yeah, that would be dope.

DAVID: Ok, so I gotta get down a little bit.

STUDENT: Ok and do the peace sign, like this.

DAVID: Oh, peace, ok.

STUDENT 2: Ok.

DAVID: Ok, now this is the peace sign, right?

Right?

Ok, you wouldn't trick me, right?

(inaudible chatter).

DAVID: Good morning.

STUDENT: Good morning.

DAVID: I'm President Wilson, welcome.

Ok, I want you guys to do absolutely well this semester, right?

STUDENT 2: Thank you.

DAVID: And you know how we define that here at Morgan?

4.0.

STUDENT 3: Right.

DAVID: Because you're future nurses.

STUDENT 3: Yea.

DAVID: Right?

BOTH: Yeah.

DAVID: And we so desperately need more nurses like you.

STUDENT 2: Yep.

DAVID: Alright, so when I see you on campus now, toward the end of the semester, I'm going to ask about that 4.0 because we have a 4.0 grade point average standard.

STUDENT 3: Ok.

DAVID: All you have to do is keep it.

STUDENT 2: Yep.

STUDENT 3: Ok.

DAVID: Right?

STUDENT 2: Now, we're having trouble finding our class.

DAVID: All right, so how can I help you?

The Mall here right, then across the bridge.

STUDENT: 4: I'm actually looking for Behavioral Social Science Building.

DAVID: Ok, and so.

STUDENT 4: But um, the girls told me that it's down here, past the bridge.

DAVID: Yes, and what time is your class?

STUDENT 4: Nine.

DAVID: Nine, ok, ok, ok.

So I want you to, you know, walk maybe a little faster.

STUDENT 4: Ok.

DAVID: Go down to the end of The Mall, all right.

STUDENT 4: Ok.

DAVID: Then go across The Legacy Bridge, the blue and orange bridge.

STUDENT 4: Ok.

DAVID: The first building to your left, because the Business School, the one to your right, is the Behavioral Social Science Building.

STUDENT 4: Ok.

DAVID: Ok?

STUDENT 4: Alright.

DAVID: All right, let's make it there fast now.

STUDENT 4: Alright, thank you.

DAVID: You don't want to miss that class.

(laughing).

Good morning, good morning, good morning.

Good morning, welcome.

STUDENT 5: Good morning.

DAVID: Are you going to class?

STUDENT 5: Yes.

DAVID: What time did it start?

STUDENT 5: Nine.

DAVID: Oh!

(laughter).

You, you can tell from the excitement that you see on the faces of the students that things are going well.

And I'm always energized, you know, when I see uh, students actually um, you know, begin to have their college um, going experience unfold.

And so, so far so good.

I mean we, you know, the campus is bustling with students, you know, we expect over 10,000 students or close to 10,000 students from all 50 states and over 70 countries.

And as I have stopped students along the way, uh, that's what I'm picking up as well.

Students from South Dakota, New York, California, Illinois, Louisiana, you know, Alabama just all over, so the Morgan name has traveled far.

♪ ♪ BEMO: I'm here with my friend Vanessa.

VANESSA ADDISON: Hi.

BEMO: Vanessa, please do me a favor, we were just talking, I need you to give your full intro to the people.

VANESSA: My full intro, so, hi my name is Vanessa Addison, I am a second-year MBA student, um, I'm also a graduate assistant for the MBA program so I run all the social media pages, so follow us, Graves Masters.

Um, I'm also an athletic intern um, for the athletic side, so I help out with football, basketball, volleyball, softball, all the teams you can name I've probably written an article, posted on social media for them, helped out um, and I previously just finished my last year playing basketball here at Morgan as well.

So.

BEMO: Superstar, superstar.

Thank you for spending some time with me today, I appreciate it.

VANESSA: Thank you.

BEMO: Let me ask you this, um, you are a graduate student, right now.

VANESSA: Yes.

BEMO: And you graduated from Morgan previously.

VANESSA: Yes.

BEMO: So I gotta ask you the very pivotal question, why Morgan State?

VANESSA: Morgan, the illustrious Morgan State.

Um, it's just an amazing school.

The culture here, the family orientation that we build, the opportunities that are at Morgan um, I started off as a Morgan State basketball player, then I moved on to intern with the athletic program while I was still playing, through that it helped me pivot and be able to work with the Baltimore Ravens which I'll be working with them this upcoming season, so it provided me those opportunities.

My advisors are amazing, um, they just provide you with all the opportunities possible, they also provided me being a Hennessy Fellow um, with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, so there's just so many opportunities that Morgan has right here that, it's a hidden gem and that if you aren't coming here, you should because it's the best program, MBA program in the whole world, so.

BEMO: Hold on, hold on.

Hennessy Fellow, under Thurgood Marshall's program?

VANESSA: Yes.

BEMO: That has to be the blackest thing I've heard today.

That's got to be the blackest thing I've heard today.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ BEMO: Yo they got a sports, they got an eSports team!

You can go to an HBCU and play video games for a living.

Your mama lied to you.

Your mama lied baby!

(laughter).

Your mama lied, son.

Oh, wow, oh wow, wow, wow, wow.

I hope you guys are enjoying this as much as I am.

Right now we're gonna have a special conversation with Tetiana Anderson featuring President Wilson, we'll be right back with more HBCU week.

TETIANA ANDERSON: HBCU week, I'm Tetiana Anderson at Morgan State University with President David Wilson.

Dr.

Wilson thank you for being here.

DAVID: Tetiana, thank you very much for having me.

TETIANA: So it's day one for freshmen, what's the energy like on campus?

DAVID: Uh, the energy is just amazing, if you will.

I have just finished uh serving breakfast on The Mall to freshman and returning students.

It's a tradition that we started here at Morgan about six or seven years ago uh, and I do it particularly for that purpose and that is to make sure that I'm in, in conformity with the energy that I see on campus and how the students, you know, sometimes uh freshman, entering students are coming with just a bit of trepidation.

They're uh, just not sure, um, they're making this transition from high school, uh, to college and um, it's good for me to kind of you know, be in a position where I can receive that and I can understand some of the hesitancy, uh, that they have and so this morning I was just amazed you know, to see thousands of students traverse to campus and the energy was off the chart.

TETIANA: You, you mentioned the word tradition, and I'm wondering how important the tradition and the legacy of the whole HBCU system really is to the whole nation, not just here in Maryland and at Morgan State.

DAVID: Uh, HBCUs have a strong legacy of rites, r-i-t-e-s, rituals, and ceremonies, and those rites, rituals, and ceremonies are laced to the historical path and significance of the institutions and so, we here at Morgan, we certainly appreciate that we put in front of our students, our university community on an ongoing basis uh, many of those kinds of events, that actually is going to uphold the great history of the institution, is gonna tell the story of the founding of the institution, is always gonna put before students, what we think they really need to know that this institution just didn't all of the sudden appear yesterday, uh, and HBCUs across the country didn't just appear yesterday.

I mean this genre of institutions uh, many of them are well over 150 years old and we have a compelling story to tell and it's very important that we tell that story in as many different facets as we can.

TETIANA: And when it comes to stories, I definitely want to ask about yours, you are from Alabama, that is home to Tuskegee University, you were raised during the Civil Rights era, how did your upbringing inform who you are today, and, and what you're doing today?

DAVID: Well um, you can never really run away from your past, and certainly in my case, I have taken my past with me as I have climbed on.

And so, growing up there in Alabama of course you know there were laws in place that did not require Black children to go to school and so I did not go to school with any degree of regularity until I was in the seventh grade and of course, you know, that had you know un, unintended consequences and I was not really exposed to formal education on an ongoing basis until seventh grade.

Um and so I um, I carry a little bit of what it means to be shut out of a formal educational system with me.

And also, I um, was a young boy when Dr.

Martin Luther King Jr.

was assassinated.

I was in the sixth grade and I can recall that day as if it were yesterday uh because all of the sudden um, the principal got on the bullhorn if you will, and announced that Dr.

King had been assassinated and everybody in the school just started yelling and screaming and crying and I began to understand that, you know, "Wow, Dr.

Martin Luther King," I'd heard a lot about him, I'd never had an opportunity of course to, come close to meeting him uh, but I realized at that point that something real precious had been taken from us.

And so then as I went on to um, undergrad at Tuskegee, I was taught by some of the most amazing professors in the country um, and basically came away there understanding all too well uh African history, African-American history, um, I began to understand what I had to, grown up living in Alabama, but was understanding it now on a highly intellectual foundation, and I mean the students here at Morgan in the late 50s, early 60s, they too were living their version of hell.

They could not go across the street and shop in the shopping centers over there, uh, and they went over there and they sat in and they sat in and they sat in and they refused to leave, uh, until those shops actually served them.

Over 400 of them went to jail and so those students on HBCU campuses, be it Morgan or Tuskegee or you name it, uh, they in the vernacular, they understood what time of day it was.

And they understood their role in making sure uh that they were speaking to the moment.

Uh, and having grown up in Alabama, I kind of experienced the same thing on the Tuskegee campus, where we were there with a purpose.

Yes!

You know, you are going to make sure you get a solid education, uh, but in the process of doing that, you're gonna understand what it means to be committed to a cause uh, and when you go out there you have to continue to fight for that cause and so as President at Morgan, I fight for the cause.

Uh, and that cause is 10 billion times greater than little David Wilson.

It is a cause that is still rooted in injustice, it's still rooted in inequality and that is really what drives me because I understand all too well what it means when those things are shut off from you.

And what really, really drives me here at Morgan is the fact that I don't want any of those things shut off from our students, the way they were shut off from David Wilson.

And that is a part of how I lead and it will forever be a part of how I lead.

TETIANA: Your tenure here at Morgan has been coined the Morgan Modern Era.

Speak to me a little bit, um, about what that mission means to you and how you're fulfilling it.

DAVID: Well, um, you know, Morgan of course when you look at our 156, 57-year history, it is an institution that has defined itself based on eras, um, and primarily through tenures of its presidents.

And so, I am in my 14th year here, uh my predecessor was here for uh, 25 plus years.

And during his time, Morgan was, was, was re-birthed.

I think that era was known as the Morgan Renaissance because you know, the institution needed a lot of care, and it needed a lot of vision.

Uh, and so when I came onboard um, I inherited an institution uh, that had undergone a renaissance.

Uh, however, what I did was I stepped back and I said "Okay, we appreciate that but we can't, can't live in the past."

And so, how do we create a shared vision of transformation.

And what does transformation, what does that look like?

Uh and so the last 14 years or so, have been about um, a transformation of Morgan.

And that transformation is defined in so many ways.

But first of all a physical transformation.

And so we have now eclipsed, $1 billion, approaching $1 billion, 100 million in either commitments that have been made to build new facilities on the campus and or to renovate existing ones.

Uh, that transformation manifests itself um in new academic re-programs.

Uh, that transformation has manifested itself um in, um the student enrollment on campus, um, we have gone from 7,000 or so students when I arrived now to approaching 10,000 students.

Uh, from 50 states, and 70-some countries.

And then of course in high quality faculty that we have um, nearly 700 faculty here, um, very diverse on the cutting edge of scholarship in so many ways.

Uh, and so, um this transformation has really been about taking note of where the institution was and then how to grow it in a way where it would be one of the most consequential, if not the most consequential university in Maryland, and one of the most consequential universities in the United States.

TETIANA: So you, you talked about several things, I'm gonna double back to some of them, but one of them is the transformation um, that's happened on campus.

I mean if you walk around Morgan State you see all these beautiful new buildings, structures, um, greens, and you have stated that you really believe in what you call the "transparency of process."

So I'm wondering, you know, you've done so much already, but what more is to come?

What's in your head, what have you got planned?

DAVID: Uh, well actually this is just the beginning... (laughs).

Uh, and, and so we want to of course continue that transformation in many of the same ways and we want to make sure you know that we have a new engineering building on campus, uh Morgan is number one in the state of Maryland in producing Black engineers, uh we're number one in civil, number one in electrical, number one in industrial, uh, and um, we are marching toward um making the case for perhaps a new engineering complex on campus because we think we can double the production of the engineers.

Uh, likewise, uh, a new science complex, um on campus as well because we are one of the leading institutions in Maryland in the production of Blacks in science.

Uh, and our facilities are not where they should be.

Um, we also want to continue to elevate our research mission here at Morgan, and so we have gone from a moderate research university, which Carnegie classifies as a R3, moderate research, to a high research institution, R2 and we thought we'd would achieve high research by 2021 uh, but we actually achieved that three years earlier in 2018.

And so now we are on a path to achieve R1 status, which is very high research.

Now for those who are listening who might not have an understanding of R3, R2 or R1, uh R1 it really means that that's the place where your most um, uh, elite research institutions rests, it's about 140 plus institutions there, the Ivy League, Big 10, University of Chicago, but there's no HBCU, R1.

And our desire is to be one of the first to get there.

TETIANA: I am a product of an HBCU myself I went to Fisk University, and you talk about the confidence that going to an HBCU instills into its students, for somebody who might not understand, describe what that means.

What do students get when they go to an institution that is sort of, of them, by them and for them that they can't get at a predominantly White institution?

DAVID: You know, I've been thinking about this a little bit differently for several years and, and, while I went to Tuskegee undergrad, this is the first time that I have had such an elongated experience um, on an HBCU campus.

And as such as I walk the campus of Morgan and I walk the campuses of some of the other HBCUs, here's what I come away with, every single day on that campus as students actually traverse those campuses, they really are in a museum.

They are in a museum, I mean the campus itself is a museum.

I'm not talking about a museum as a building on the campus, I mean the entire campus is.

Uh, and it is rooted, so richly in history, uh, that speaks to them every single day, right?

Um, there's a story behind the name on the building on every single building here.

Uh, and when the students actually become intrigued by that and they commence to research that, that in and of itself builds confidence, it builds a sense of belonging, right?

And so when you put that together, just being in an environment where you have incidental learning taking place every single day with the formal education that they're getting, that really instills uh, unparalleled confidence in students.

And so, um, when students uh, leave Morgan, uh and they go on to grad school or they go into the world of work, it's very important you know for them to stand there, toe to toe with anyone and not be challenged by um the fact that someone else may not have been exposed a certain way, uh and our students won't own that, they will not own lack of exposure, on the part of others because they are fully, fully confident in themselves.

And that's what you get here at Morgan, that's what you get on an HBCU campus and I would say, because most of my career, other than Morgan, has been spent um, in uh, very large you know, research based traditionally White institutions, but that's one of the major differences that I see, uh between HBCUs and what I call "TWIs."

TETIANA: President Wilson, thank you so much for this conversation.

DAVID: And uh, Tetiana thank you very much for inviting me into this dialogue.

TETIANA: And thanks to you as well for watching HBCU Week.

BEMO: Whoo, what a time a time.

I learned something, I hope you learned something.

I thank you for watching HBCU Week.

I am your culture correspondent, Bryant "BeMo" Brown, thank you for watchin', we'll see you next time.

We were talking to the President, Dr.

Wilson earlier today.

JUSTICE GEORGIE: Ok.

BEMO: And he said that one of his main goals is to make sure that students have confidence so they can go into the world and be great people.

How has Morgan helped foster your confidence?

JUSTICE: It's the fact that you know, wherever I go, alright, I wear Morgan State University on my sleeve, right?

BEMO: Yeah.

JUSTICE: Uh, last week I went to DC, right, you know?

I uh, it was this, it was this cool brother, you know like selling oils, you know, right?

It was like he's trying to put me like in this box right?

BEMO: Yeah.

JUSTICE: You know, "The problem with ya'll is, you know, you know, I, I bet you've never even had you know, like a class about us."

I said, "Wait a minute sir, I apologize you don't know me, so let me shake your hand, while you look me in your eyes, my name is Justice Georgie, alright?

I attend the illustrious Morgan State University, the only National Treasure, alright?

And my sophomore year I had an African Diaspora class so you've never met me, so now, now I had to introduce myself so you know like we can kind of form a relationship.

BEMO: That's right.

JUSTICE: Right?

Everybody on this campus is different.

BEMO: That's right.

JUSTICE: Everybody on this campus is for a common goal, knowledge is power.

Knowledge is power.

Knowledge is power.

(music plays through credits)