ABSTRACT
While there has been signi¿ cant attention given to the efforts of public colleges and universities and their efforts to attract student of color, little attention has been given to the enormous inÀ uence of key private talent identi¿ cation programs in recruiting such students. Public institutions of higher education initiated minority recruitment programs in great numbers after the 1964 Civil Rights Bill and the 1965 Higher Education Act, and more forcefully after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in 1968. These programs were established in conjunction with the TRIO programs founded by the federal government that provided funds for Project Upward Bound, Talent Search and Student Services Equal Opportunity Programs (EOP) on public campuses were created and offered students in these programs a myriad of academic support services including special counseling, tutoring, remedial, and enrichment courses. In her case study of the ¿ rst decade (1965-1975)
Williamson provides an excellent documentation of the issues and challenges of these programs. 1
While most of the minority recruitment activities on public institutions grew out of the Black power student protest movement as well as Civil Rights legislation, this essay shall discuss the National Scholarship Service and Fund for Negro Students (NSSFNS) founded in 1947 as the ¿ rst talent identi¿ cation program in the nation to identify and place Black students in predominately White institutions of higher education.
