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Books, Inq., a blog by former Philadelphia Inquirer books editor Frank Wilson, points to an interesting post last week by Michele L. Simms, who’s taught at the University of Michigan and University of Rochester. She’s now teaching at Howard University and Prince George’s Community College, and she’s noticing a difference between reading habits at her previous employers and at historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs):

While I am far more tolerant of my students in the community college who are less likely to read a short story I assign since the majority of the students are at the college because they have not proven to be high academic achievers, I am intolerant of my students at Howard University, who are supposed to represent our communities’ best and brightest. Like so many blacks in my generation, Howard University has been positioned as the Harvard of the HBCUs. Although it may be somewhat conceivable for a white student to matriculate and graduate from Harvard without reading, I don’t have a Black friend who graduated from Harvard without reading. In fact, all of my friends and colleagues who are Harvard alumni are avid readers. I know that the majority of my students at Howard would not last one semester at Harvard without reassessing their commitment to reading, attending classes, studying, and improving their writing skills.

E. Ethelbert Miller is a poet and the director of the African-American Resource Center at Howard University. He is the author of numerous books of poetry and a memoir of fatherhood.

When I contacted Miller about this portrait, we discussed the quality of the natural light in his office.

“Does your office face south?” I asked Miller. “In Washington, D.C., southern windows get good light.”

“My office faces Mecca,” Miller informed me.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Which way is Mecca again?”

“I’m just kidding,” Miller said.

Last night’s Democratic debate on PBS was a first on several fronts: It was the first time the candidates focused on minority issues before a panel of minority journalists. It was a first for Howard U, which had never hosted a presidential debate. And it was the first time bloggers got official media cred.

They had to give up a little pride though, as in: “You’re with DancyPuppyDance@blogpost.com?” wasn’t going to cut it. Bloggers had to ban together under the Media Bloggers Association to get their seat at the table, located, incidentally, in a different building entirely. (The “media center” was set up in Blackburn Student Center instead of Cramton Auditorium, where seats were reserved for Cornel West, et al.) So what came out of their all-access pass? How about a video comparing Sharpton’s scowl to a chipmunk on YouTube? Good stuff!

What I want to know is how come none of them caught the giant hole in the ass of the pants worn by the handler for Mike “These Prices are InSANE!” Gravel? According to one eyewitness, the guy’s briefs were on display every time he got up to wipe the sweaty brow of his guy. And no one thought to take a photo? If you have one, send it over.

Kanye West has built a career on being a college dropout, and Cam’ron has complained that attending university would only get in the way of his Lamborghini habit, but the historically contentious relationship between hiphop and higher learning is easing. In an effort to further convince aspiring rappers that book learning can complement street knowledge rather than cancel it out, Howard University is looking into establishing a minor in hip-hop.

The campaign to create the minor, which would be the first of its kind in the country, is being waged by Joshua Kondwani Wright, a Howard University graduate student, who hopes it will be offered within the next 3 to 5 years. Toward that end, Wright organized the March 30 Hip Hop and Higher Education Symposium, a daylong event that brought in such hip-hop insiders as WKYS-FM radio personality Jeannie Jones and video director Lil X. Wright says sessions such as “Hustle and Flow: The Economic and Political Impact of Hip Hop” were designed to be the basis of possible future course offerings.

Wright, who began working on establishing the course of study at the beginning of this semester, says that historically black colleges and universities like Howard are behind on the hip-hop-education trend.

“Doing research I found [hip-hop courses] at Stanford, a number of Ivy League and state schools, but not too many HBCUs—�it was kind of shocking. More are starting classes, but it still seems that HBCUs should be at the forefront of this push.”

Dr. Elizabeth Clark-Lewis, a professor of history who teaches the course “A History of Hip Hop” along with Howard alum and former 106th and Park host AJ Calloway, maintains that hip-hop has been at the center of Howard courses since the early ’90s, but says that a minor focusing on the genre would be a part of a “cultural continuity” at the university.

“I think it’s very possible and, I stress to say, very probable,” Clark-Lewis says. “Howard has always taken the lead in terms of African history and African American history.”

Although the minor is still a few years off, Wright is already looking to go major. “One of the quotes I said [during the seminar] was from Big: ‘Who ever thought that hip-hop could take it this far?’ One professor is doing a graduate seminar at Georgetown in hip-hop this fall. In 1980, no one ever thought that Georgetown would have a graduate seminar in hip-hop.

“In that sense, there’s no reason [Howard] can’t have a minor in a few years and no reason why, maybe, it couldn’t be a major.”