The Afro American Experience: Sept 9

Albuquerque native Scott Carreathers has been the director of African American Student Services, or the “Afro,” as the students call it, for eight years. The organization tends to the students’ needs, be them academic, financial, social or spiritual.
DL: Even spiritual needs?

SC: Even spiritual needs. That means you can refer students to local churches, or you can bring pastors here or you can host bible studies within African-American Student Services … Our duty is to fulfill those needs in whatever way we can, whether we do that directly or through referrals or different things like that. … That’s the ultimate goal: to graduate.
DL: So that’s a really personal thing you guys do here.

SC: It’s almost a ministry and a mission, to be honest with you. And that’s perfect what you said; It is personal. It’s personal for all of us that we ensure that we do that.

DL: You guys are like the surrogate parents.

SC: That’s it. No, I think that’s perfect. That’s what we act as. We really do.
Carreathers said his staff is the strongest advocate for students on campus. When students are having trouble in the classroom, someone from the “Afro” will go with the student to talk to the instructor, whether it’s about the grade or cultural sensitivity.

Academic adviser Cherese Fine said she helps coordinate programs, workshops, presentations, cultural events for the “Afro” and beyond. They focus on résumé writing, job recruitment and partnerships with the Black Graduate and Professional Students Association.

“We do the Winter Roots Festival every December, just an end-of-the-year celebration,” she said. “In February we have the black cultural conference. It’s usually a host of series of events. We have a speaker, and a gospel night where we bring in a gospel choir. It ranges each year, the stuff that we do.”

Carreathers said if these centers weren’t here, it would be an “interesting picture” for minorities.

He said there are 850 African Americans on campus, and his goal is to increase that number to 1,000 or more by 2015.
“I think UNM is one of those gems that people don’t know about, so we got to get those messages out,” he said. DL: We can do this off the record, but what did you think about the whole Locksley thing?
SC: Obviously, it was very unfortunate on a whole lot of levels. What happened was very unfortunate. Very unfortunate that it was two African American men. For the University, it just didn’t look good. But the fact of the matter is I consider Mike a friend and I’m very supportive of him. I really believe that he has a really good vision for this program, and he’s going to have to have some time to implement that. … (It’s) some self-inflicted stuff that he has done, but the media is harsh, and I don’t think they should be that harsh on him because Mike’s a good brother. He really is. I like him. I wish he could bring that back, revisit it, but you can’t, so you have to move on, and that’s what he’s going to do. That doesn’t have to be off the record because that’s how I feel.

DL: OK. How did you end up in this position?
SC: I came to UNM in ’94. I was at Texas Southern University in Houston. A friend had mentioned UNM has some jobs, so I came and started as a recruiter. Then I went to academic advising. And then the former director was a friend of mine and said, “Scott, you really should apply for this position,” and I applied for the interim and didn’t get it. So I figured I’m not going to get the position, but I applied for the full-time position and did a lot of interviews and a lot of praying and a lot of all this and that and, sure enough, I came into the position.

DL: So, in Texas, you were a student or working?
SC: No, I was working as an Upward Bound counselor. It’s a federally funded program that attempts to enhance the academics of high school kids to prepare them for post-secondary education. But I loved that job. I really did.