David 31 years late in realizing need for FAMU to recruit top student scholars like athletes

At the June 22 meeting of the Florida Board of Governors (BOG), FAMU Provost Marcella David spoke about the university’s efforts to recruit more transfer students who’ve finished associates of arts (A.A.) degrees. She told the BOG that she’d heard a good idea from some other higher education leaders.

“I’ve heard other presidents and provosts talking about recruiting students the way you recruit athletes and that’s one of the ways that we’re going to focus on, in particular, our transfer students, is recruiting them in the way that we recruit athletes as well,” David said. 

David is 31 years late in realizing the need for FAMU to recruit student scholars like athletes. Back when Frederick S. Humphries became the president of FAMU in 1985, he did just that. His top targets were the best performing high school students. Humphries' aggressive recruitment strategy was key to his success in taking FAMU to #1 in the recruitment of National Achievement Scholars and boosting overall enrollment numbers by more than 100 percent over his 16 years in office.

A November 25, 1992 article in the St. Petersburg Times entitled: “FAMU at top for enrolling scholars” talked about Humphries’ approach to recruiting students. An excerpt is below:

As he scouted the country for top high school talent, Florida A&M University President Frederick Humphries would think of himself as a college football coach on a quest to be No. 1.

The only difference was that he was recruiting brains, not muscles.

Now FAMU has enough brainpower to be ranked No. 1 on a prestigious academic list.

This year the school enrolled more National Achievement Scholars - considered the country's best and brightest black high school graduates - than any other college in the nation…

Humphries used a football philosophy to propel FAMU in the academic rankings.

"I recruited these kids just like . . . head coaches go out and recruit blue-chip athletes," Humphries said in an interview after the news conference.