Global Journal of Management and Business Research, B: Economics and Commerce, Volume 22 Issue 4

4 Global Journal of Management and Business Research Volume XXII Issue IV Version I Year 2022 ( ) B © 2022 Global Journals Racial and Community Wealth Disparity the Bane of HBCUs: A Wealth Ecology Model Relational Perspective achievement gap as compared to other racial groups. This they attributed to differential behavioral norms that negatively impacts African Americans. This highlights the importance of subjective norms and perceptions pertaining to the African American student’s immediate environment as an important driver than what occurs nationally. For African American students, Maxey et al. (1995) indicate school choice as mostly dependent on programs offered, their location, quality of housing system and education offered, commute distance, academic reputation and financial aid availability. Their research finds that cost of education is of highest influence for African American students followed by family income. And that African American students with lower achievement scores are more likely to attend HBCUs. And by implication, from majority poor neighborhoods and communities. Low achieving students are linked to low wealth communities where student preparation for college is considered poor(Cheatham et al., 1990; Brown & Burnette,2014). School systems within low income and poor communities are said to be without some education enhancing structures and resources generally available in affluent communities that aid student learning and development. Are HBCUs stuck with underachieved students they need to spend more on average to develop their full potential to be able to be competitive? Sissoko and Shiau (2005) investigated the factors influencing African American students HBCU choice with the findings suggesting African Americans HBCU enrollment is influenced more by tuition and fees (education cost), the availability of financial aid, African American population trends, school retention rates and federal policies. They did not find student household wealth as a significant influence on choice of HBCU attendance though there is a positive relationship which they find as not significant. This they attributed to the general real median income decline over the study period. This outcome seems to be at odds with Maxey et al. (1995) finding that student family income, that contributes to student achievement levels, has influence on HBCU choice. These studies agree that cost of attendance is the highest consideration to the African American student preparing for college education. However, the verdict on household wealth (that has elements of attitude – perception of level of wealth and subjective norms – perception of family support) is mixed. That is, students’ ability to afford college education and have intention to attend is not yet agreed to depend upon their perceived wealth status. A major proportion of schools’ revenue comes from students’ tuition and fees and therefore the quantity of students admitted become important. The level of student population in a particular school also affects all other school financial receipts - grants and awards. Most HBCUs have struggled with dwindling student rolls (Sissoko & Shiau, 2005) exacerbated by the reducing African American male(Simms et al., 1993) proportion and the quality of students they receive. Schools struggling with student enrollment, are known to struggle financially, with some closing(Harper, 2019). The enrollment numbers for schools could be used to gauge the struggles of institutions especially, HBCUs who tend to face dwindling external funding sources. Strong enrollment numbers are therefore boon to the school all around. d) Objectives and Hypothesis Do HBCU students' represented communities determine HBCUs wealth status? The community served by HBCUs is represented by students coming from diverse communities but mostly the African American communities facing racial and structural discriminatory wealth disparities. Here, the community-institution relationship is between the institution and its student population primarily. Since students come from different minority communities and are not homogeneous, the implication of the relationship is in general across all such communities from which HBCU students are based. Given the purpose of establishing the relationship between HBCUs and their served community’s wealth, this requires determining the relationship between HBCUs and their students’ wealth. This may answer whether HBCU students’ wealth status is a source of the struggles of HBCUs. On the surface, this seems so. Further, HBCUs student body are, majority African American with some level of minority groups and more recently, some white students (Harper, 2019; Kim & Conrad, 2006)The objective is to determine how HBCUs struggle with African American students’ enrollment is linked to their students’ wealth status. The result will help shed light on whether HBCUs served communities’ wealth status influences HBCUs speculated non-competitive status while adding to the literature on HBCU school choice and clarifying the dimension of wealth. School enrollment occurs as a result of prospective students’ school choices. There are multiple reasons for students’ school choices. There is need to know whether the African American student wealth status has a relationship to African American students’ choice of HBCU attendance or whether African American students of HBCUs do have a different wealth profile than African American students who attend non- HBCUs. There is the fact that African American students make their initial intention school choice based on their perceived achievement level and may choose HBCU (Maxey et al. 1995) as a result of their low achievement. Simms et al. (1993) find personal and pre-college factors are better predictors of college attendance by African American male students. Whereas Pigini and