During a time when segregation plagued the county, a program intending to expand educational opportunities for African-American students in Tennessee’s higher education system began. After 38 years, Governor Phil Bredesen announced the end of this settlement in September 2006, leaving the redistribution of the scholarship uncertain.
Rita Sanders Geier, a law student at Vanderbilt University and professor at Tennessee State University, sued the state of Tennessee and the U.S. government in 1968, claiming the higher education system in Tennessee was segregated.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Geier, and required the “maximization of educational opportunities for black citizens of the State of Tennessee,” according to the settlement.
On Sept. 11, 2006, the settlement ended. “Today, I’m proud to announce that Tennessee has met the challenge set by the Geier lawsuit – to build a unitary public higher education system that truly offers equal access to all citizens,” Bredesen said. “Now, we’ll ask a judge to recognize something that we’ve long felt in our hearts . in Tennessee, the door really is open to all.”
Today, over 125 African American students at ETSU currently receive scholarships based on the Geier settlement, according to Pat Sheets, coordinator for the Office of Equity and Diversity.
Most of the scholarships the Office of Equity and Diversity uses for the recruitment and retention of African-American students has come through Geier.
“We don’t want to lose all of the effort put into the recruitment and retainment of African-American students through programs such as Discover and Quest, and we are looking for other funding possibilities, Post-Geier,” Sheets said.
Money from the Geier settlement subsidized programs like Discover, which introduces African-American high school students and their parents to ETSU, as well as the university’s financial aid and admissions process.
Funding from the settlement also sponsored Quest, a special orientation for African-American freshmen.
Without Geier money, the university will have to find other means to support these programs.
“Starting last fall, all of the students that are getting what would have been a Geier Scholarship at that time will keep their scholarship until they graduate, as long as they maintain their GPA and full-time student status,” Sheets said.
Since the court order requiring Tennessee state schools to give state-allotted scholarships to African-Americans students ended earlier this fall, the money might be allotted to other minority groups in the years to come, according to Kathy Feagins, director of the scholarship office. Most likely, each campus will decide which population is least represented and funding will be distributed accordingly.
The scholarship office won’t know how the changes will directly affect ETSU minority students until everything is finalized, which may not be until the 2007-2008 academic year.

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