“This is a travesty for the nation.”

The president of Morehouse College doesn’t mince words with his reaction to Thursday’s decision from the U.S. Supreme Court, which rules colleges and universities can no longer use race as a factor in their admissions.

Dr. David A. Thomas says look to the future to 2050, when many of the college students of today become society’s leaders. “You’re likely to see that lack of diversity in those selective colleges start to show up.”

Thomas, president of the historically Black Atlanta school since 2018, says his school competes for students “with the likes of Harvard, Duke, UNC, Yale.” He tells WSB Radio, “on one hand I think (the Supreme Court decision) is a travesty for the country. If people ask me, all told, the impact on Morehouse, I can paint a very positive picture.”

“We also represent a school that provides the same opportunities upon graduation that those predominately white selective schools provide. So, I think we’ll become more attractive,” Thomas says.

He predicts a spike in prospective student applications to “more than double in the next three years as a result of this decision.” Thomas pegs the number to jump from 7,000 applications to about 14,000.”

The challenge Thomas says, is historic underfunding of HBCUs, like his school. “That because of resource limitations, we won’t be able to serve all of the deserving students that we could admit, without compromising the quality of our admissions pool at all.”

Thomas hopes individuals and organizations can step-up to fill a funding need for HBCU’s. “Hopefully, this will have philanthropists, foundations, corporations, now asking the question, if we really want to invest in racial equity in this country, we need to invest in the organizations that have already proven that they can successfully influence that happening.”

Thomas says if the answer is yes, “I think it should lead to a significant increase in philanthropic support and corporate support for institutions like Morehouse.”

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