When Zyearre Amoah was a student at Sacramento State in 2023, there were times when he felt like the only Black student.
"There were African-American students on our campus," he recalls. But at a sprawling state university with more than 30,000 students, "it just felt like we had to look for each other."
Amoah graduated in 2024, just as his university was launching its Black Honors College, a school within a school with a special focus on Black history, life and culture. He's now a staff member at the BHC, as it's called, helping recruit students.
"Unfortunately I didn't have the luxury to be part of it as a student," he says, but the university's effort to elevate, and celebrate, the scholarship of Black students has changed how he perceives his alma mater.
"Black students on our campus are actually showing their faces," he says, laughing. "That is really helpful for everyone here. We're finding each other relatively easier. "
The initiative at Sacramento State, formally known as the California State University, Sacramento, began just months before the Trump administration began its widespread assault on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs on college campuses. In the last two years, dozens of colleges and universities have rolled back or eliminated such offerings to avoid accusations of racial discrimination that have led to loss of research funding and other sanctions.
"Historically, the campus struggled to create an environment of success" for Black students, says Luke Wood, Sac State's president, who helped create the BHC. "So we created an intervention that was designed to meet their needs while also serving any student who was interested in being part of it."
Wood sees this as a vital part of his, or any university's, mission. "I think that more institutions could be easily doing the same."
An 'elite, specialized experience'
There are more than 800 students currently enrolled in the BHC, and while the majority of them identify as Black, African, African-American or mixed race, Wood insists it's not exclusive and that it complies with federal and state laws.
"It's nondiscriminatory because you can be a white student, an Asian student or Latino and be in the Black Honors College," he says, "and we have non-Black students who apply who want to have an elite, specialized experience."
All of the college's courses are taught from a Black studies perspective. A math class, for example, also includes stories of famous Black mathematicians.
Faculty are chosen based on their track record of educating Black students. Among the criteria are low withdrawal and failure numbers for those students.
Now in its third year, women make up a majority of the BHC's enrollment, according to the college's dean, Boatamo Ati Mosupyoe. That's the case on most U.S. campuses. She says one of her priorities is to change that. To do so, she plans to provide more male role models and mentors: not just to convince more men to enroll, but to support them when they do.
A climate of disappearing diversity programs
Following the Supreme Court decision in 2023 banning affirmative action, the Trump administration has launched civil rights investigations targeting programs that single out a specific race — such as a scholarship program for Black students or an office designed to celebrate multiculturalism.
In September, the Treasury Department proposed a new rule that would strip private schools and colleges of their tax-exempt status if they provide help to students based on their race.
At President Trump's State of the Union address in February, he declared, "We ended D-E-I in America!"
Around the country, many students have felt increasingly isolated, and let down, as diversity programs have disappeared.
"I was pretty sad just at the fact that our university would comply with those federal guidelines," says Hayden O'Neill, a senior at the University of Michigan. She was part of a scholarship program that was shut down last year.
"It definitely feels disheartening," she says, "I don't feel as comfortable as I thought I would at a school like this."
O'Neill is one of the many students around the country who say that understanding their identity – especially as it relates to their race – is a high priority in college. And while O'Neill feels like she is losing some of that opportunity, students in the Black Honors College say they're being given that chance.
A strong sense of belonging
The bell above the door to the Black Honors College headquarters – housed on the first floor of Sac State's library – rings often:
A sophomore arrives to meet with an advisor. A first-year student has a question about tuition. Over in the corner, a professor has come to ready his notes before class. It's a hub, a home within a home.
On a recent day, one of the students in the office is Naomi Thrower, a junior majoring in Deaf Studies and American Sign Language.
She wanted to attend a historically black college, but California doesn't have any. So, she says, Sacramento State with its BHC felt like the closest alternative.
Growing up in the East Bay, she had what she calls a very multicultural experience, going to school with kids of all different races. While she gained a lot from that, she also felt she was missing a deep understanding of Black culture and identity.
"The kids used to bully me in middle school and say I was whitewashed," Thrower says. "So when it came time for college, I wanted to be surrounded by students who looked like me and also had that same academic drive."
She runs a natural hair business on campus as a side hustle, and says it has helped her develop a creative expression. "In high school, when I'd say I have to do my hair, my friends wouldn't understand it's an all day thing. They'd be like, 'Why does it take so long to wash and brush out your hair?'"
But when she made friends in the honors college, it seemed everyone understood. "Two of my friends helped me take down my hair. We detangled it, washed it. We were just listening to music and hanging out, and that was the community that I was longing for, just someone who understood."
She and others NPR talked with often quoted the saying, Ubuntu, which comes from South African philosophy. It describes an interconnected way of living, often translated as, "I am because we are."
Many students said this concept is central to their educational experience.
And at Sacramento State, Wood says, the efforts to build that identity and sense of community are paying off: Enrollment of Black students is up – and those students are doing better – with more of them re-enrolling, and graduating.
