In Black America, Black History Facts

The style of teaching has most definitely changed since the 60’s.  Teachers were more concerned with creating core lesson plans for the week, and less interaction with their pupils.  Most students were just trying to beat the odds and graduate to go off to college or join the service to provide better living conditions for their families.

In 1969, there were not enough black college graduates to satisfy industry demands.  Black graduates at major and minor colleges were charmed by eager companies and recruiting on black college campuses hit an all-time high.  The placement director at Florida A&M reported that until recently 18 to 24 companies regularly sent recruiters to the Tallahassee campus.  Also, in that same year representatives from roughly 500 firms came looking for graduates to fill jobs “right across the board in business and industry.”  Southern industries, however, were still under-represented.

One indication of the demand for black graduates was the rise in the number of personnel agencies finding jobs for skilled and professional blacks in industry.  In San Diego the community relations specialist Carroll W. Waymon spoke for many, however, when he described the darker implications of the increased demands for black graduates he said “I feel that I cannot be a man, just a man, and a Negro at the same time.”  He continued with this:

To me, being a Negro or a black man is to play a role.  And it’s this perception of me that causes me to have to play that role because of my blackness that I resent most…

This dichotomy that one lives with…I think is the core of the reaction of the black man.  He cannot, for example, be just another bum, just another criminal or saint or good man.  He must be a Negro doctor, or a Negro principal, or a Negro reporter instead of just being a reporter, a doctor, a man.

(In Black America, 1970, Books,Inc.)