There is a fire burning within Black students who attend predominately white universities across Indiana, at least according to Brad Gray, an African-American, who recently graduated from Ball State University.
Gray says that some of the things he faced during his time as an undergraduate include arriving at class early, taking a seat and having everyone sit around him instead of next to him. There also weren’t many professors who looked or thought like him and he believed that other students did not trust him to complete tasks during group projects.
Gray thinks that the difficulties minority students face while attending institutes of higher education are issues they typically only talk about among themselves. Inspired by personal struggles and the struggles of friends, Gray and three other Ball State students decided to shatter the silence.
They created a two-part documentary chronicling the experience of African-American college students attending Indiana universities. The film, “Fire Burning Higher Learning,” aims to look at equality on college campuses. The first installment focuses on Ball State University, and the second expands to other universities around Indiana.
Gray said he learned a lot while creating the film.
“We learned that there is no correct way to analyze the issues that African-American students deal with, but what we did find was that there was a concurrent majority of Black students at many different schools in Indiana who all feel the same way,” said Gray.
Many students said that they can relate to the documentary and believe the questions “Fire Burning” brings up are important.
Remesa Scruggs, an African-American student at Purdue University, says that she believes minority students might have more difficulty shifting from high school to college for reasons other than intelligence or personality.
“When I first got to Purdue, I felt as if nobody wanted to talk to me or get to know me in my dorm. I tried to reach out but felt a very cold reception from them. This led to me feeling like I didn’t belong and it was hard for me to get help from my peers,” Scruggs explained.
Ball State University student Rachel Hardy experienced similar struggles.
“All through elementary, middle school, and high school I went to schools where the population was majority African-American,” Hardy explained. “Coming to an environment where I am the minority in many of my classes made me feel like I didn’t fit in and was alone. I’m not sure if it’s because I happen to be the only Black student in the class and the Caucasian students are just more receptive and comfortable with other Caucasian students.”
Gray thinks that in most instances things like this don’t happen because of purposeful racism or hate, but instead because of lack of knowledge concerning those who are different. In his documentary, he talks about the things students and administrators seem to be afraid to say.
“These things need to be discussed with a diverse group, maybe even in a required class, so everyone has an understanding of each other. With things like race, creed, ethnicity, sexual orientation or religion we really have to have a better awareness and knowledge of who they really are as a person,” said Gray.
The documentary “Fire Burning High Learning” can be found on Youtube and Vimeo.
