Texas A&M’s interim president tells members of a board of regents committee about the success of a new initiative to bring more African American high school seniors to Aggieland.
Dr. John Junkins says the “Quest For The (Aggie) Ring” effort began after learning 30 percent of black seniors accepted offers to attend A&M, compared with 50 percent of Hispanic and 50 percent of white seniors.
Junkins said “the fundamental challenge on diversity of our student body is the perception that exists out there in the state of Texas that a large fraction of African Americans still have the legacy of all-male, all-white, all-military from pre-Rudder. And we have to remove that.”
Junkins says the initiative is “led by our own undergraduate students, our African Americans, and led by former Aggie students who are African Americans who came here, loved it, and succeeded big time after they were here.”
Junkins added they are “the voices of African Americans who happen to be Aggies”, and that “is a lot more powerful than an ugly white guy like me talking to African American students.”
Junkins told the regents academic affairs committee this is the first year of a four year effort, where “we’re going to move the needle on the perception of African Americans, their parents, their high school counselors, on this (Texas A&M) being a go-to place where African Americans can come (and) do extremely well.”
When one targeted group of 50 seniors were exposed to the initiative, Junkins said 49 decided to come to A&M this fall.
Click below for comments from John Junkins from the May 19, 2021 Texas A&M system board of regents academic affairs committee meeting.