Chapter 1: First Fields
Meet Cheryl and Mike before either understands what the fraternity world will cost them.
He came to me like in a midnight dream, a shining prince. I had his favorite jersey in my hands, the Washington Redskins football special edition with Sonny Jurgensen’s number and name.
“Can I have that,” he asked.
Mike was the first man I met who wasn’t taken by my beauty. He seemed genuinely interested in who I was. We had that in common. We knew people look on the outside without peering into the soul. Mike and I were drawn by the pull of our souls.
The student body at Maryland State University consisted of 33,000 undergraduates. Of that amount, 10% were Black, a high ratio considering the retention rate for Black students was only 29%.
When you spotted three Blacks in a freshman seminar, and believe me, it was no problem counting the Black students in a class, even a large introductory class, little did most of us know that at least one of us wouldn’t make it past the first year, probably three out of us four.
But there was Mike.