If a white man can graduate from Morehouse, why can’t a black man become president?
Morehouse College, an institution with a 141-year history of educating black people, has something to be proud of. Morehouse took on the challenge of adding diversity to its school, and succeeded in bringing another group of educated people back into our world. On May 18, 2008, a young man named Joshua Packwood became the first white man to graduate as valedictorian. He earned a 4.0 GPA degree in economics.
Packwood is not the first white man to attend Morehouse, nor is he the only one who has graduated. Like most historically black institutions, there were many students on campus who were not black. In 1966, Howard Zehr was the first white student to receive a degree from Morehouse.
It seems that Morehouse was quite accepting of Packwood. At Morehouse he did the following:
He was elected dorm president for his freshman year.
He showed that the behavior was very pleasant.
He was a Rhodes Scholar finalist.
He has a position in the ranks of an investment firm (Goldman Sachs) in New York City.
Some have said that Packwood Morehouse chose to use “black”:
In Kansas City, Mo., he was among the few white students in his class at Grandview Senior High School
His mother married a black man.
Siblings mixed race.
What is the future of Morehouse? Will black universities be “extinct”?
According to an article in The Chicago Tribune, Packwood chose Morehouse over the ivy society school, Columbia University. While at Morehouse, Packwood said, “I was forced to see the world in a different perspective that I don’t think I could have found anywhere else.”
Regardless of why he went to Morehouse, what matters most is that Packwood seemed to have a great use for it. Morehouse like everyone else. He worked, he stuck and he earned that degree. John’s younger brother will attend Morehouse next year.
Is this the face of Morehouse to change? Will more white men choose Morehouse over other institutions? If so, will this change our education system?
Personally, I don’t think so. Packwood is not the only person to graduate from Morehouse. His story is unique. From what I read in several blogs, a young man from Morehouse named Joshua Harris also graduated with a 4.0. Not even himself.
