North Central Removes Race Restrictions From George Floyd Scholarship After Civil Rights Complaints

A scholarship created in honor of George Floyd at North Central University has quietly been replaced with a non-discriminatory version.

The original scholarship, which was exclusively for black students, was unlawful because it excluded non-black applicants, violating Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits racial discrimination in federally-funded institutions, an expert on the matter told Alpha News.

The scholarship was first announced by North Central’s president during a June 2020 memorial service held at the university’s downtown Minneapolis campus.

At the time, then-president Scott Hagan introduced the “George Floyd Memorial Scholarship” (GFMS). The scholarship was only open to students who are “Black or African American, that is, a person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa,” according to the original description.

Hagan challenged other college presidents across the U.S. to follow his lead. Dozens of universities did just that, establishing similar GFMS programs, many of which were also limited to black students.

Mark Perry, a former economics professor at the University of Michigan and an emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, filed a federal civil rights complaint against North Central in May 2021.

“It seems like there’s this unawareness or lack of concern in higher education. They must know that these are illegal because the law is very clear and simple … there was no way that they could legally defend a black-only scholarship,” Perry explained.

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