Restored decades-old federal scholarship program for HBCUs supports nation’s food supply

By Stephon Dingle

Click here for updates on this story

    Maryland (WJZ) — A decades-old federal scholarship program designed for 19 Historically Black Colleges and Universities has been restored after it was temporarily suspended by the Trump administration’s Department of Agriculture.

The 1890 National Scholarship pays the full tuition of selected students from underserved communities to study sciences, such as agriculture and food safety.

The 1890 scholar program is accepting applications for the next school year. The deadline is March 15.

Maryland HBCU highlights program’s efforts

The University of Maryland Eastern Shore is highlighting the work of its students and how this federal funding is helping those students support the nation’s food supply.

“People don’t know that agriculture is everything,” said student Almazi Matthews. “It’s very hard to be in a field that is outside of agriculture in some way.”

Also known as UMEC, the school has been known for several decades to matriculate students directly into the U.S. Department of Agriculture through the 1890 National Scholars Program.

The program provides full tuition to students studying agriculture at 19 HBCUs across the country.

“A lot of our students who receive training and work in the lab are first-generation students from underrepresented communities,” said Dr. Sadanand Dhekney, a professor at UMES.

“Our main goal is just to improve food safety and quality of different types of food,” said Dr. Salina Parveen, a UMES professor.

Protecting the nation’s food supply

Through UMES’ School of Food Science and Technology, students and their faculty work hand-in-hand perfecting their craft to protect our nation’s food supply. In one lab, they are working to prevent food contamination and illness.

“To address this issue, our lab is conducting research on different aspects of food safety, such as poultry, seafood and fresh produce,” Parveen said.

“On the other hand, if you look at these plants, they’re completely clean,” Dhekney added.

Vital and tedious work happens in these labs to get food safely from the farm to the fork.

“Our role is to find the genetic mechanism of resistance,” Dhekney said. “Why does one species of grapes have extreme resistance to a disease where the other species of grapes are so susceptible?”

“It’s about keeping our food system secure from the start of the chain to the end,” Matthews said. “It’s like, OK, can we grow it, can we package it, can we sell it, is it safe? So there is a lot that goes into it before it gets to the grocery store.”

Restoring the 1890 program

The security and stability of the program came under attack in February when the USDA suspended the program before restoring it days later.

Dr. Heidi Anderson, UMES’s 16th president, immediately got to work.

“We were able to work behind the scenes, working with our federal agencies and with our congressional leadership, and were able to get the scholarships reversed,” Anderson said.

Inspired

For now, at least, upon graduation, scholars like Matthews are able to join the USDA to work in the area where she studied and served summer internships.

Matthews says the scholarship program is more than just a love for agriculture and protecting the nation’s food supply. She was inspired by her grandmother Bernice Washington, a 1963 graduate of UMES.

Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.