Introduction
Project 1000 is a recent movement led by the Department of African Americans studies here at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign based of Project 500 which happened in 1968. The purpose is to increase the enrollment of African-American students at the university to 1,000 African American students enrolled per year by the year 2020, additional support African American studies and the Bruce D. Nesbitt African American cultural center. The group references that in recent years the number of African-American students attending the University has dropped. They want to make sure that in future years African-Americans have an involvement at the University and they do not want to see the black student population to lose numbers or get less involved.
Argument For Project 1000
The argument behind this is that the African American population is underestimated at the university compared the percentage of the African-Americans in the Illinois population. The state of Illinois has an African-American population percentage of 14.7%. At the University of Illinois the African-American percentage population is 6.21%. African-American students want to fight for the percentage of African-Americans in the University are as closely represented to the state African-American population percentage.
Outside Support
Students on campus were asked about their thoughts about the under representation of African-American students at the school and their is growing support by other students on campus for Project 1000. Students were in disbelief about how underrepresented black students are at the school and are very eager to see changes being made in order to increase the enrollment of African-Americans. Support for this program from other campus groups is very good which will give project 1000 a better chance to succeed.
Campaign Methods
The movement is student run by the Black United Front. The campaign focuses on providing African-American students with financial and academic support. The campaign uses a variety of methods such as social media, posters, and meeting with school officials. The group is creating an advisory committee made up of both students and administration members. The group will focus on recruiting black students by over-seeing program budgeting and a dispersal of resources to programs focused on retention. The group believes black students are not receiving enough support once they are in college. They want to make sure black students are succeeding in the classroom and being able to come back to the school.
Similarities to other Innovative Movements
Project 1000 is obviously based off of Project 500 which increased African enrollment to 500 black students per year. Project 1000 is very similar as it is almost entirely student run. Project 1000 is also very similar to the previous movement from Hispanic, Asian, and African American students. Project 1000 has similarities to the DRES program. The DRES program wanted to give students with physical disabilities a chance to get a college education and have a voice in the school. These programs are both similar because they are bringing students to the school from different demographics and people who are physically disabled. Through both movements as well as the ones by other ethnic groups are diversifying the student body to represent the general population.
This page has paths:
- Project 1000 Kamil Piotrowski
