Addressing Basic Needs at HBCUs: Strategies for Enhancing Student Success

ABSTRACT

This article explores how two research‐intensive Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) are responding to undergraduate students’ basic needs. Guided by Brey and Hodara's (2023) basic needs services implementation rubric, we used qualitative data from 50 participants, including students, faculty, staff, and administrators, to assess the institutions’ implementation of basic needs services. In particular, we focused on the ways in which two HBCUs, one public and one private, experienced challenges in providing timely and accessible resources and services to students. Although grounded in specific institutional contexts, this study offers insights that may also be instructive for similarly resourced HBCUs. We also examine how faculty and staff address the stigma associated with utilizing basic needs services, especially as shaped by cultural and community dynamics.