DATE: Saturday, October 11, 1997            TAG: 9710110422

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B5   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY PHILIP WALZER, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: RICHMOND                          LENGTH:   61 lines

PANEL BACKS VCU'S PLAN TO OFFER AFRICAN-AMERICAN STUDIES DEGREE ONE MEMBER FEARED THE PROGRAM WOULD RACIALLY DIVIDE THE RICHMOND CAMPUS.

Overriding the objections of its only black member, a state education subcommittee voted Friday to endorse a new bachelor's degree in African-American studies at Virginia Commonwealth University.

With virtually no discussion, the Planning Committee of the State Council of Higher Education voted 2-1, with one abstention, to recommend the new degree. The full council will consider it next month.

Twice before, the Planning Committee had deferred a vote because of the objections of council member Jeff Brown. He feared the degree program would racially divide the campus and would not accurately represent the breadth of the black experience. Brown cast the only negative vote Friday.

The committee's vote greatly improves the odds that the full board of the state council will approve the new degree. The board rarely rejects the recommendations of its committees.

About a dozen VCU administrators and students attended the council's meeting. Afterward, many all but declared victory in the long-running debate over the degree.

``I'm very pleased that we'll go ahead with it,'' said Edgar A. Toppin, distinguished professor of history and African-American studies. ``They have this degree at so many other places; I'm glad that we're catching up.''

VCU officials argued that the degree program had strong student demand and could help link the university with the black community in Richmond.

``It offers the opportunity for some VCU students to major in an important liberal-arts study,'' VCU President Eugene P. Trani said after the meeting. ``It is an area where we have assembled a cracker-jack faculty to help understand the experience of African-Americans in the United States.''

Board members of the state council routinely approve degree programs, like the VCU plan, that have been endorsed by the agency's staff. Some observers saw Friday's vote as a turning point that could have ushered in a new level of council involvement in curriculum matters. A negative vote ``would have given (the council) a precedent to micromanage all Virginia universities,'' said Lance Reynolds, a VCU sophomore from Hampton.

Allison Aheart, a junior from Richmond, said: ``I don't believe it'll split the campus at all. Caucasians and everybody can take the courses and see with sensitive eyes how our ancestors lived.''

During the council's meeting Friday morning, board member Anne Marie Whittemore offered the only comment on the VCU plan, thanking college officials for their detailed responses to Brown's questions.

Whittemore, a Richmond attorney who is a former board member of Old Dominion University, said she voted for the program because ``I thought it met our program approval criteria,'' which includes factors such as student interest, fiscal impact and curriculum content.

Brown, a buyer for Circuit City Stores who was appointed to the council last year by Gov. George F. Allen, said he wasn't disappointed. He said he looked forward to the ``give-and-take'' when the council debates the issue next month.

Norfolk lawyer John D. Padgett, the council's vice chairman, said he's still not sure how he'll vote. Brown ``is a black male and he has some concerns, and I'd like to have some more discussions with him.'' But Padgett also said, ``I would hope great deference is given to the committee'' decision.

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