Full Rides and a Change of Tide

It's the end of the week already Wildcats! Time flies when you're at colleges all day.

We awoke to a cloudy day in Birmingham, Alabama. Our first stop was another HBCU, Miles College in Fairfield, Alabama. Miles is a small campus with only 2000 students.  Miles College was founded in 1898 by the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church. It offers 25 bachelor degrees and is one of 16 schools in the Nation with a Center of Academic Excellence under the office of the Director of National Inteligence.

At the end of our tour, we returned to the admissions department for a little trivia and a big surprise.  Jada and Lexus, number 1 and 2 in the class, were awarded full ride presidential scholarships to Miles based on their ranking.   Let's rack up those college dollars!

Next, we had some down time so we visited the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute.  When Birmingham was originally founded, it was known as the Magic City since employment opportunities abounded.  As we toured, we experienced the transformation of Birmingham as the "tragic city", called so because of it's intensely rooted segregation that made it a center of change during the civil rights movement, to the historic place it is today.  The stories enlightened students to all the pinnacle moments that occurred in Birmingham including the 16th street church bombing and many peaceful protests against continued violent acts in the city.

Our second college of the day was University of Alabama, Birmingham.  UAB is one of the biggest schools we visited thus far. It is considered a mid size college with an enrollment of over 18,000 students and 60 majors to choose from with an intense focus on research, even at the undergraduate level.  The weather was a cool 85 degrees and our tour guide joking told us their winter is like Chicago's fall.  At the end of our tour, we found Blaze, the dragon, and he wished us a good trip.

We made our way to Memphis for our last evening at a hotel.  Tomorrow's trip includes Rust College in Misssissippi and University of Memphis.

For more information on Miles College, go to www.miles.edu.
For more information on University of Alabama, Birmingham check out www.uab.edu