Commentary: Young, Black and Attending College in Small Town, USA

Commentary: Young, Black and Attending College in Small Town, USA: I had always dreamed about leaving Richmond, Ky., the small town in which I was raised. I dreamed of pulling myself out of the sinking sand of poverty, drug addictions and an overall absence of people who looked like me. It seemed like the faster I moved, the harder it became to find a sturdy foundation and a face like mine to pull me out.

I am the face of Small Town, USA. I ran out of there kicking and screaming to the University of Louisville for my undergraduate degree, just to find myself right back after graduation in the city I had run away from. As I now find myself working in higher education in a rural setting not too different from the one I knew as a youngster, I look at the African-American student population and those students in similar settings around the U.S. and realize that there is a desperate need for support and community for these Black collegiate students.