We Need Partnership, Not Rescue A New Vision for Philanthropic Investment in HBCU Research
As the unreliability of federal funding threatens the support of programs designed to support underserved communities, it is time for philanthropy to build a better funding ecosystem.
In the world of Star Trek, scarcity does not exist. Hunger, poverty, and even money itself have all been eliminated. Why? The replicator. A device that materializes whatever you need: food, tools, technology. In that imagined future, want is obsolete. Everyone has what they need to thrive. What if researchers and funders built something far better than fiction ever imagined? It would require a mindset shift. We would need liberation from traditional funding partnerships – a shift to ones that center trust and community.
We have entered an era where entire research agendas can disappear with the stroke of a pen.
Executive orders aiming to end diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives have led to the termination of federally funded DEI programs at various institutions, including HBCUs. These actions have disrupted research projects, student support services, and community engagement efforts that are integral to the HBCU mission. The cumulative effects of these policy shifts are a climate of uncertainty and fear among researchers and administrators at HBCUs. Instability hampers long-term planning and discourages innovative research. It also threatens the sustainability of programs designed to support underserved communities. We are always recalibrating, adjusting, and translating our ideas into someone else’s language to be seen as fundable. This process is exhausting, unsustainable, and, most importantly, unnecessary.
This is more than just a funding issue. It’s a crisis of imagination. A system of failure.
Co-Created is Liberated: A Model for Liberatory Partnership
Planning for the future is hard when the floor keeps shifting beneath you. Of course, for HBCU researchers, federal funding has always been a double-edged sword. On one side, it represents opportunity. Federal funding is often the only route to support high-impact, equity-focused research. On the other hand, federal funding comes with conditions and is vulnerable to the whims of political tides. One year, HBCUs are in favor; the following year, we’re erased. Research on Black health, mental wellness, and racial equity suddenly becomes too “controversial” to support. Faculty self-censor, students lose mentors, and administrators shift priorities just to survive the next budget cycle. Lately, the blade feels even sharper.
In a funding landscape where most support feels like a game of “how small can we dream,” the financial support I received from Hopelab’s HBCU Translational Science Fellowship was different. I didn’t have to shrink my vision. I wasn’t asked to make my work more “palatable” or “fundable” by stripping it of its cultural roots or relevance to the communities I serve. Instead, I was invited to lead, build, and ask the questions that mattered to me and the students and communities I deeply care about. I was ready to do the usual song and dance when I became a Translational Science Fellow. Instead, I was trusted and encouraged. And not just to deliver a polished product, but to explore and build alongside underserved communities.
That is what liberatory partnership looks like.
Hopelab didn’t just offer resources: they offered trust, flexibility, and time. They allow my work to take shape organically, providing me space to iterate, collaborate, and co-create with the people most impacted by the questions I am exploring. That kind of support is rare in academic research spaces where control often outweighs curiosity and equity becomes a checkbox rather than best practice.
Not Just Funding, A Model to Value Experiences
For me, this fellowship isn’t just a funding opportunity. It’s a model for how funders and scholars can build something real together to value lived experiences and center minority voices. This fellowship doesn’t demand that we contort ourselves to fit into someone else’s idea of rigor. And let me be clear: this isn’t a story about one lucky break. It’s a blueprint. If Hopelab can build a partnership grounded in respect, imagination, and shared purpose, then others can do the same.
We don’t need more grants that ask us to prove our worth, but we do need partnerships that begin with the assumption that we are already worthy. The equity work we do at HBCUs deserves to be funded because it dares to imagine a better world. So, if one partnership can shift how I think about funding, imagine what a whole ecosystem of liberatory partnerships could do.
Building a Better Funding Ecosystem
Philanthropy has a powerful opportunity right now to embrace liberatory, trust-based funding that centers community leadership, values alignment, and long-term capacity building. But let’s be honest: the bridge between the philanthropic sector and HBCUs needs repair. Despite their track record of producing Black scholars, leaders, and changemakers, large U.S. funders decreased HBCU support considerably between 2002 and 2019. Specifically, in the early 2000s, major U.S. foundations gave significantly more to HBCUs than they do now. In 2002, HBCUs received $65 million in philanthropic support from large foundations, but by 2019, that number had dropped nearly a third to $45 million, and that’s before adjusting for inflation. Interestingly, in that same time period, elite PWIs (Predominantly white Institutions) saw donations in the hundreds of millions. The disparity isn’t just about money. It’s about imagination, and through which lens the work is seen as visionary.
To build a better model, we need to ask: what would it look like to fund research at HBCUs in ways that reflect the urgency of the work and respect the dignity of the people doing it?
Liberatory funding means:
Trusting HBCUs to define the questions, not just answer them.
We know what matters to our communities.
Funding infrastructure, not just projects.
That includes research staff, technology, evaluation capacity, and time.
Understanding that impact takes time.
Community-rooted work doesn’t always move at a quarterly reporting pace.
Resisting the urge to over-measure and under-resource.
Sometimes, the best outcomes aren’t captured in a dashboard.
Philanthropy has flexibility that federal systems often lack. That’s the gift. However, flexibility is only powerful if paired with the commitment to trust and share power. That includes relinquishing the desire to control the narrative, the pace, or the definition of success. Liberatory partnerships allow scholars to engage in bold and culturally grounded work and ensure that the work is accountable to the people it aims to serve.
This is about more than correcting historical underfunding. It’s about recognizing where the future is already being built and funding accordingly.
An Invitation, Not a Plea
To my colleagues in philanthropy
If you want equitable outcomes, fund like it. Invest in HBCUs not because we need saving, but because we are already doing the work. Support Black scholars not as an act of charity, but as a commitment to a future where equity, innovation, and cultural accountability are the norm rather than the exception.
And when you do invest, do so in a way that honors our leadership. Avoid parachuting into our communities with pre-defined agendas. Instead, co-create with us. Be in conversation with the people your funding is meant to impact, and take time to understand our methods and goals.
To my fellow scholars, especially those at HBCUs
You are not alone in this push for something better. Many of us are navigating the same bureaucratic roadblocks and internal negotiations between integrity and survival. But we are also part of a larger movement toward a different way of doing research – one that makes space for our full humanity, appreciates our cultural knowledge, and recognizes our refusal to be boxed in by outdated funding models.
Liberatory partnerships show us what’s possible. With the right collaborators, we can do more than just publish.
We can heal. We can build. We can transform.
We don’t need a replicator. We need each other. And with the right partners, we can build something far better than fiction ever imagined.
