Topic > The Importance of Interracial Education - 1779

Integrated colleges in the South before the start of the Civil War were rare, however Reverend John Gregg Fee was able to promote interracial education by founding the town of Berea and Berea College. As the first interracial, coeducational college in the South, educating black and white individuals, both male and female, Kentuckians saw this as taboo in a predominantly slave society. Fee achieved many successes, such as founding the utopian community of Berea and founding a non-sectarian church that did not discriminate against its own denomination. Fee was a strong advocate of "impartial love", believing that one's race, sex, or religion should not be a factor in obtaining this kind of love. Fee's most notable achievement was the founding of Berea College as an interracial college in a slave-holding state. However, this achievement did not last long and by examining the effects of the Law of the Day, the actions of former Berea College presidents and the world outside the Berea community, one will see how the College has not been consistent with the goal of Fee of an interracial equality. instruction. Prior to the creation of Berea in 1855, Kentucky had no colleges available for blacks to have the opportunity to receive a college education. Berea College was the only college in Kentucky to educate blacks for thirty-one years, until Kentucky State University, the only historically black college and university [HBCU] in the state of Kentucky, was founded in 1886, providing blacks in the state the opportunity for an education. Since Berea College was the first school established to allow blacks a college education alongside whites, this was an important consideration for blacks and former slaves in the area, as well as southern whites who...... middle of paper.... ..entry, especially for the people of the South. Although Fee achieved this remarkable goal, it has been diminished by Kentucky laws, the ideas and beliefs of former college presidents, and others at the outside the community of Berea. An interracial education still exists in today's Berea, however, it does not resemble Fee's vision when Berea College was founded. Berea College was once a fifty-fifty college when it came to black and white students, however today it is over 60% white with the remaining 40% minority. The fifty-fifty relationship was an example of an ideal interracial upbringing and how a certain group was too large, overwhelming others. Without an ideal interracial education similar to the one Fee originally created at Berea College, the College will not be able to restore Fee's vision of Berea College as an interracial college..