From Engineer to Educator: A Passion for Purpose Everett Roper, Educational Leadership, EdD

From Engineer to Educator: A Passion for Purpose

Everett Roper

Educational Leadership, EdD

Dr. Jill Channing, Faculty Advisor

Written by Hannah Warren

Everett Roper earned his bachelor’s degree in engineering from The University of Alabama Huntsville in 1993. After working in the industry for five years, he decided to begin teaching, part-time, as an adjunct professor at a local community college and university. He fell instantly in love with this job, and three years later, he left his position as an engineer to become a full-time faculty member at a Historically Black College and University (HBCU) teaching subjects from engineering and computer science to computer information systems. Then, after fourteen years in this career, Everett decided to go back to school to pursue a master’s degree in order to further his teaching abilities. While earning his masters, he continued to teach full-time at the HBCU and part-time at a local community college. During his time working at the two institutions, Everett began noticing disparities between them. He expected to see some of these incongruencies since the HBCU was a private school and the university was public. But he noticed additional problems the HBCU was facing in terms of function, and he wanted to understand why

they were occurring. Digging deeper, he spoke with colleagues from other HBCUs, and it became clear that the problems faced by his institution were not isolated to a single HBCU. In his never-ending passion for learning, he decided to seize this opportunity as a chance to earn a second doctorate degree while researching these incongruencies. He stumbled upon ETSU and realized it was the school best suited for what he wanted to pursue; he contacted the department, applied, was accepted, and selected Dr. Jill Channing as his committee chair. Historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) are higher education institutions established in the United States before the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and were primarily created to serve the African-American community. Throughout his career in higher education, Everett served on several nationwide committees including the United Negro College Fund, the National Society of Black Engineers, and the Southern Education Foundation. When HBCUs were first created, there were few to no opportunities for African Americans to attend institutions of higher education. While attending meetings for these committees, Everett noticed consistent talk about funding, and whether increasing enrollment of African Americans or raising tuition was the best way for schools to increase revenue. Everett had suspicions that while these methods might solve the immediate problem, in the long run, they were not contributing to fulfillment of the purpose of the institution. This led him to ask himself questions about the mission and vision of HBCUs. Without quality standards for admission, are schools being effective in their mission? If schools raise tuition, potentially excluding well qualified students from being admitted, are the schools effectively accomplishing their mission? These questions formed the basis of Everett’s current dissertation research, which examines whether or not HBCUs are functioning today, in the 21st century,

“Without quality standards for admission, are schools being effective in their mission?”

the way they were intended to function at the time of their inception in the mid- 1800s. In his research, Everett has found that many HBCUs have not altered their mission since their founding, which may be the source of their struggles.

Everett’s experience working directly in HBCUs and serving on committees placed him in direct contact with numerous individuals from other HBCUs, which helped facilitate the methodology for his research conducting interviews with those directly involved in administration with HBCUs. He chose to interview only administrative personnel because they are directly involved, every day, with the mission of their respective institutions. The response he received was overwhelmingly positive. So many individuals involved with HBCUs were eager to participate in his research, demonstrating their clear understanding of the relevance of his research to the institutions. In Everett’s initial proposal to ETSU’s Institutional Review Board (IRB), he planned to conduct face-to-face interviews with participants so he could not only have a verbal response from participants, but also be able to observe changes in participants’ demeanor in response to the questions and progress of the conversation. However, as the COVID-19 pandemic spread, he was forced to change the format of his interviews to Zoom, which still allowed him the ability to see his interviewees, but limited the personal interaction that face-to-face communication affords. The interviews consisted of 18 questions and were expected to last 30 to 45 minutes. A couple of the main questions included in the interview protocol were:

1. How would you improve your institution’s mission statement?

2. Based on what you know about your institution’s mission, would you amend it to make a difference in the future?

Altogether, eleven individuals participated in interviews, and only the shortest interview lasted within his originally expected time frame. His longest interview lasted an hour and forty-five minutes, with an average interview length of one hour. This is a testament to the level of discussion that the subject brought out.

Everett Roper Dr. Jill Channing

“...larger schools have a commitment to diversity, beyond being exclusively an HBCU, but clear diversity related to gender and race...”

has begun the analyzation process. Already he is seeing that many smaller HBCUs seem to be operating just to stay afloat. Funding is low, faculty are short-staffed, and recruitment and retention are low. However, some of the most prominent HBCUs, such as Morehouse, Clark Atlanta, Spellman, and Howard, are doing very well. Everett is finding that these larger schools have a commitment to diversity, beyond being exclusively an HBCU, but clear diversity related to gender and race. Diversity in these institutions extends beyond the student body to the faculty and administration. Across the board, they are willing to accept change; they are progressive, and willing to make changes to their curriculum to keep up with the times. When Everett began his research, he was expecting to see similar struggles among all HBCUs, but as he is finding, the struggles are not necessarily the same.

Everett is encouraged by the passion and concern of the individuals who participated in his research, but there is still very little data on the subject, outside of what he has collected. Everett commends Dr. Channing for giving him the freedom in his research to explore his subject area while still remaining accessible to him. Without ever condemning, she has offered, instead, recommendations and provided him with alternative perspectives to examine in his research. Everett appreciates the concern Dr. Channing has for his work and for HBCUs. From the first class Everett taught as a high school PE teacher to the work he did as a graduate assistant in his first masters, Everett’s passion for teaching continues in his current research. Beyond striving to be a good educator himself, he hopes that he will be able to share his work with the HBCU community, potentially through written publications and a possible administrative role in the future.

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