Ok, it’s been race week here at Born Curious. I’ve just read another thought-provoker – this one on the native Black versus immigrant Black segments of American society. Check out the full article here from The Huffington Post
Barack Obama has broken racial barriers. But his stint at Columbia was not one of them.
Obama’s status as a son of an African immigrant puts him in a category and debate that largely remains behind Ivy League walls: black students from immigrant families are over-represented in Ivy League schools.
“Immigrant blacks,” who come from families who have emigrated from the West Indies or Africa (mostly Ghana or Nigeria), make up 41 percent of the black population of Ivy League schools, according to a 2007 study by Princeton and University of Pennsylvania researchers. In contrast, black immigrants only make up 13 percent of the black population of 18-19 year olds in the United States.
The over-representation of immigrant blacks on Ivy League campuses is forcing students to redefine their own “blackness” and black culture, while raising questions about affirmative action and access to the best universities in America.
An interesting personal anecdote shared in the article – good reminder that there is no monolithic “Black”:
He soon found his niche as the Black Men’s Forum president, but encountered other problems, this time within the black community on campus. “I had a really difficult time fitting in at first,” he said. “I felt sort of prepared to not fit in with the white kids, but I wasn’t prepared to not fit in with the black kids.” Personal identity converged with issues of collective identity- the native black American experience was different than the Nigerian-, Ghanaian-, or Jamaican-American experience, and this manifested itself in various ways.
“You realized there were these great divergences, socially, politically,” said Terry. “Sometimes they were small things like music, but sometimes they would be full blown prejudices.”
Born Curious 
How unfortunate it is that blacks are unable to find the basic common ground they share and share in the education experience at an Ivy League.
I agree it is competitive out there, but the reason for attending school is to obtain an education. Everyone needs to focus on that and not anything other than that.