Haynes Gives HBCUs a Voice in Washington - Higher Education: When Leonard Haynes III came to Washington in 1989 as an assistant secretary of education, the Southern University-trained historian found a national government marked by bipartisanship, collaboration and cooperation on a wide range of topics of importance to people of color in higher education.
For sure, institutions focused on serving people of color were not getting all the funds or programs they wanted from the federal government. Still, there was some desire for diverse perspectives to be heard when decisions were being made about how to distribute federal funds to the nation’s higher education community.
Today, the landscape and environment are “more partisan and less collaborative and cooperative,” says Haynes, who at 65, is marking 15 years of continuous service in Washington as an inside advocate for historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and other institutions with histories of serving students of color.
