Realization, Responsibility, Results: The Founding and First Decade of the Black Student Union and its Impact on Bowling Green State University

BTSU 316

At BGSU, the Black Student Union started out of necessity. We will look at life for the black college student at a PWI before black students and how that was changing in the 1960s. We will then move on to the development of the first known Black Student Union and how it inspired black college students throughout the nation. Comparisons will be made between the Black Student Unions in the United States and student activist groups in South Africa. This will set the stage for the founding of the BSU at BGSU. The research focuses on the role of BSU in challenging and forcing change at the university from 1969 to 1980. Three different lists of demands were given to the university during this time. What inspired these lists and what were their results will be used to organize the account of this early, yet definitive, period in the history of the Black Student Union.