Md. College, Once A Pioneer, Works To Regain Diversity

This fall, the number of minority students inched up to 35. With 489 students at St. John's, that equals about 7.2 percent of the student body.

"It can be a scary prospect," said Jamaal Barnes, 20, a black sophomore at St. John's.

Barnes, raised mostly by his grandmother in North Carolina, is the first in his family to attend college. As a high school senior, he had his pick of schools. He applied to 22 colleges and was accepted to 21, most of them offering full rides.

The path to the golden life, he was told, is good grades, internships, diploma and job. The St. John's program didn't fit that mold, which was partly why he chose it.

"At most schools, knowledge is quid pro quo," said Barnes, who meets the more than $45,000 annual cost of attending St. John's with grants, outside scholarships and jobs. "One is learning for the sake of temporary goals: grades, job, money. Everything is a competition: Who's going to be valedictorian? Who's going to get the internship? . . . Here, you take the time to examine the very foundation of things. It's an exercise in intellectual fortitude."

But as St. John's administrators have pursued minority students, they have realized part of the problem is campus culture.

"You can't just say, 'Let's get students of color,' " Bowden said. "There has to be an attitude and environment here for them to feel at home."

W.E.B. DuBois has been added to the school's curriculum. Tutors have held studies on Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass alongside the usual discussions on Ptolemy and Nietzsche. And students, on their own initiative, have led discussions on race and its impact at the college.

"There's not been any hesitation to do this, but there is a desire to do it right," said Barbara Goyette, vice president for advancement. "People want it to happen the St. John's way, in a way that's organic."

Next month, the college plans to host for the first time a campuswide celebration for Martin Luther King Jr. Day. A gospel concert is planned, and of course a reading and meditation on King's most famous speech, "I Have a Dream."

For alumnus Dyer, whose presence on campus began with and now centers on the struggle for diversity, the modern-day effort at St. John's is a new source of pride.

"Back then, it was an indication of the character of the school, a place conducive to new ideas and discussion," he said. The only difference now is that the situation has flipped. It's no longer the school that needs to be convinced that it needs minorities, Dyer said, it's minorities who need to be convinced that they need a college such as St. John's.