Summer Donaldson
Editor In Chief
It has been said that walking into Clarence Terry’s office, Director of university Multicultural Recruitment, is like walking into a room that’s engulfed in prestige and respect. Awards of achievement, appreciation and recognition are displayed all around the room. One wall is covered with a map of the world and is surrounded by black and white photographs of Nelson Mandela, Dr. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and other influential revolutionaries.
Terry’s road to the appreciation and achievement started right here at BGSU.
“I started school at BGSU in 1968 through the Student Development Program. Shortly after graduation, the director of the program asked me if I would like to work here [BGSU]. I started as a financial aide advisor. I moved from that position to the director of the program. At that point, we did recruitment for students of color. When (former BGSU President) Dr. Olscamp came, he said suggested that recruitment should be in one office. We hired to other people to assist me with student of color recruitment,” Terry said.
The Office of Student Development was established to recruit African American, Hispanic and Appalachian American students to Bowling Green State University. Educational talent search programs, minority student activities, research and evaluations and the Project Search programs were created by the office. The Office of Student Development was broken up and minority student recruitment was moved to the Office of Admissions.
“At first we started to recruit only in Ohio. When Dr. Sidney Ribeau came to Bowling Green, he suggested recruiting out of Detroit because it is the second largest populated area from Cleveland to Bowling Green. It took up to four years before we got one student out of Detroit. That was because we were competing with colleges that had been recruiting there forever,” Terry said.
Currently, Bowling Green State University has more than 3, 600 multicultural students. Non-white Bowling Green students make up over 17 percent of the total population. That’s an eight percent increase from Bowling Green’s fall 2001 class!
“Your best recruitment is to tell people what you have to offer and to tell people the truth about the school. After that, you have to assist those people with problems they may have,” Terry said.
BGSU Senior, Brian Robinson, said that Clarence Terry was a major reason why he came to BGSU.
“Clarence Terry came to my high school in Toledo. In fact, he came twice. I wanted to go to college but I didn’t know how to go about getting there. He let me know about financial aide. Today, he still helps me with any problems that I may encounter,” Robinson said.
Bowling Green State University is comprised of students from fifty states and seventy-seven countries. Clarence Terry’s recruiting office travels to all of these places in order to diversify the university.
“We set up student recruiting territories. My territory is Toledo, Cleveland, Detroit, New York, Atlanta, Washington D.C., and Los Angeles,” Terry said.
“One reason that we look to those cities is because we wanted diversity, but in order to get the numbers that we wanted, we had to travel outside of Ohio,” Terry said.
However, traveling outside of Ohio sometimes calls for Clarence Terry to recruit international students.
“Once, I went with Clarence to Africa,” recalls his wife, Dr. Ardenia Jones Terry. “He brought at least six students to Bowling Green. The students did not have their Visa’s however, Clarence helped them. Clarence has also gone to Mexico and Texas to bring quality students to Bowling Green,” Terry said.
Terry travels the country to recruit students during the majority of the school year. However, he says that the traveling is in not a problem for his family.
“This is not a job where you would just come to work and sit. In the fall term I leave home on a Sunday and return on a Friday. The other terms, I travel three or four days maximum and then I return home. At times traveling is not that bad, then again, at times the traveling is worse. My wife is an Associate Vice President for the University of Toledo and she travels also. So I guess that you could say traveling is just in our blood,” Terry said.
Dr. Ardenia Jones Terry supports her husband and his job.
“I think what Clarence has been able to bring to Bowling Green is nothing short of a miracle. I will always support him,” Dr. Ardenia Jones Terry said.
Despite the long hours and traveling, Terry looks at the benefits of his position.
“I think it’s been worth while. We’ve had a good diversity of students of color here on campus. I think that the students learn from each other. I think the dominant population learns from the diversity that’s on campus. Basically you have two groups of people that come to Bowling Green. One group comes from the rural farming community and the other group comes from metropolitan area. The students tend to learn from each other. There’s a good mixture of students here,” Terry said.
Washington D.C. native and BGSU senior, Arkilah Womack believes that Bowling Green State University has offered her a cultural exchange.
“Since I came to Bowling Green State University, my opinion of what I considered the other America has been shattered. All of the culture clash and the culture shock that I have been experienced has given way to a well-need culture exchanged. I know that it will prepare me for the future,” Arkilah said.
The 2004-2005 incoming freshman class was the largest incoming class in the history of Bowling Green State University. Terry credits the Center for Multicultural and Academic Initiatives, academic enhancement, tutorials and faculty and staff as being a main reason of minority enrollment.
“When I was in school people didn’t like Bowling Green because of some of the racial overtones. Now, there are students who love it here. There are a multitude of reasons why students of color come here. If students utilize the services that Bowling Green has to offer, they’ll like it here,” Terry said.
Terry’s main focus is to recruit students of color for Bowling Green State University. After 31 years of recruiting minority students, he has kept that focus by changing Bowling Green State University’s demographics. One could compare him to the revolutionaries that surround the walls of his office.
“When Clarence and I went to Bowling Green, there were only 50 minority students. He has recruited Puerto Ricans, Latin Americans, Asians and Africans and he has changed the mosaic of the campus,” Dr. Ardenia Jones Terry said.