In February of 2014 “Akon” or Aliaune Damala Badara Thiam established “Akon Lighting Africa,” an organization that’s goal is to bring electricity to over 600 million Africans. Already Akon has made extensive gains across the continent improving the lives of millions. Surely if Akon and two of his friends can come together to change the world we in the AUC, living in the legacy of The Movement, are morally called upon to do the same. Here's five ways we can start!
5 world problems AUC students can solve when we’re adults:
- End of World Hunger:
- According to Global Citizen: One third of the food produced worldwide is wasted, costing the global economy around US$750 billion per year. Yet more than 850 million people around the world are starving.
- If HBCU students collectively placed an emphasis on changing policy in the U.S. and around the globe, to fight private companies like Monsanto, reduce food waste and give tools and resources for farming in Third World countries we’d get rid of a problem that has existed since the Old Testament.
- End racist education practices in US schools:
- It would only take one of us in the AUC to become the Secretary of Education for the US. As a cabinet member mandate funding for schools to do workshops on race and intersectionality, restructure mainstream public school curriculum to teach mandatory classes on minority history and have reviews of textbooks to ensure an accurate portrayal of the US’s troubled history.
- End racist voting practices and Gerrymandering:
- The Supreme Court recently stripped back enforcement of Section 4 and 5 of the Voting Rights Act arguing that it’s no longer needed. Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg described it as “Throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.” AUC students are generally very socially and politically conscious, a seat from one of us in the Supreme Court and more of us in Congress that have unwearied integrity would be all that’s necessary to change this dismal decision.
- End of police brutality and corrupt policing practices:
- The issue of police brutality is one that is ultimately racial but can be solved through a somewhat non-racial means. Most are aware of the vast difference between deaths by gunshots in the US and in Scandinavian countries. This isn’t a homogenous population but instead because of the three year bachelor degree required before serving in places like Norway. It would only take a great mind like Michelle Alexander’s, in the AUC to publish a text on the importance of more police training to radically shift the way Americans view good policing and start us on the road to more fair policing.
- End the epidemic of gang violence in our communities:
- The most commonly used argument against police shootings in the black community being racist is the absurd amount of murders that take place within the black community, or “black on black crime.” While this argument is inherently flawed and racist in itself, black on black crime is a problem. If HBCU students as a collective made a deliberate decision to live in our own black and neglected communities once we’ve amassed our own wealth we would by extension rebuild our schools and businesses, mentoring black youth would become the norm and we would be able to re-build the black family thereby re-establishing black love for self. This existed under Jim Crow as blacks were not nearly as impoverished as they are today, we simply didn’t have access to the same resources as white under the “separate but equal” principle which is why we called for desegregation.