SOUTHERN JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS JULY 1990 1890 INSTITUTIONS IN A CHANGING SOCIOECONOMIC ENVIRONMENT: IMPLICATIONS FOR HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT: DISCUSSION

Jones and Parks have prepared an interesting and importantly, the poverty rate for black children (i.e., thought-provoking paper on the historically black under 18 years of age) was an astounding 44.2 land-grant colleges and universities (commonly re- percent in 1988. ferred to as the 1890 institutions). They describe the Education has played a crucial role in the limited mission of land-grant universities, trace the devel- economic progress that blacks have achieved. Nev-opment of a dual system in the southern states to ertheless, equal access to higher education continues accomplish that mission, address the contribution to be an elusive goal for many blacks. During the and role of 1890 institutions, review problems fac- 1960s and early- to mid-1970s, the college enroll-ing land-grant universities, and offer a prescription ment of blacks (age 14 to 34 years) was on the rise. for change. The authors have examined some impor- By 1977, blacks accounted for 10.8 percent of per-tant issues. However, some are addressed in a cur- sons enrolled in college (U.S. Bureau of the Census, sory manner due to the brevity of the paper. For 1988). In 1988 (the latest year for which data are example, in the section on contribution and role, available), their proportion was only 10.2 percent. Jones and Parks do not emphasize that the 1890 Although the proportion of blacks graduating from institutions are unique. That is, they are a different high school has been increasing, a smaller share ha