1976 At Brown University the Third World Center (TWC) opens in the basement of Churchill House. The TWC serves as a gathering place for students of color, and a home base for student of color organizations. Eileen Southen becomes the first African American woman appointed full professor with tenure at Harvard University (Afro-American Studies and Music).
1977 Renowned opera singer Camilla Williams joins the Indiana School of Music faculty and becomes the first Black professor hired to teach voice.
1978 In Bakke v. the Regents of the University of California the U.S. Supreme court ruled racial quotas to be unconstitutional, even as it supported the general practice of affirmative action in higher education. Barbara Christian becomes the first Black woman to be granted tenure at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Clifton Wharton becomes the first African American Chancellor of the State University of New York System.
1979 Henry Louis Gates, Jr. becomes the first African American to get a Ph.D. at Cambridge University (English).
1980 Marian Wright Edelman becomes the first African American female member of the Spelman College Board of Trustees.
1981 Dr. Jewel Plummer Cobb is appointed to the presidency of the University of California, Fullerton, becoming the first African American female president of a major West Coast University. The Carter G. Woodson Institute for African & Africana Studies is established at the University of Virginia. The Association of Graduates at the United States Military Academy, West Point, establishes the Henry Ossian Flipper Memorial Award, given annually to the cadet who has demonstrated the greatest character and leadership in the face of unusual adversity.
1982 Dr. Grace Harris becomes the first African American Dean at Virginia Commonwealth University. She becomes dean of the School of Social Work, which had previously denied her admission on the basis of her race (in 1954).
1983 In July of this year, Cheney State College becomes a part of Pennsylvania's fourteen-university State System of Higher Education and changes its name to Cheyney University of Pennsylvania. The Institute for Research in African American Studies is established at Columbia University.
1985 Williams College establishes the Gaius Charles Bolin Fellowships in honor of the first African American of the College.
1987 Clifton Wharton becomes the leader of the Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association and College Retirement Equities Fund (TIAA-CREF), and in so doing becomes the first African American to head a Fortune 100 company.
1988 Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity is established at Brown University. Temple University African American Studies becomes the first Ph.D. granting African American Studies department in the world.
1990 Barack Obama becomes the first African American president of the Harvard Law Review.
1992 Derrick Bell leaves Harvard Law School to protest the institution failure to tenure a Black woman professor. Omphemetse Mooki and Owen Maubane become the first Black South Africans to graduate from Stanford University. The Monogram Club Building at University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill is renamed the Blyden and Roberta H. Jackson Hall, after this pioneering Black faculty couple who played an instrumental role in integrating the UNC faculty.
1993 Dr. Grace Harris becomes the first African American appointed to the position of Academic Provost at Virginia Commonwealth University.
1994 Nima Warfield becomes the first African American Rhodes scholar to graduate from a historically black college or university (Morehouse College).
1996 California's Proposition 209 is passed by the electorate, effectively banning the use of race as a factor in college admissions.
1998 Lani Guinier joins the faculty of Harvard Law School, and in so doing becomes the first tenured Black woman professor in the history of the institution.
1999 On October 23rd, following a $5.8 million dollar enovation, Ohio University's Templeton-Blackburn Alumni Memorial Auditorium is rededicated in honor of the school's first Black male and female alumni. U.S. President Bill Clinton grants a posthumous president pardon to Lieutenant Henry O. Flipper, the first African American to graduate from West Point, acknowledging the injustice of Lt. Flipper's court martial, and recognizing his accomplishments.
2000 Harvard University appoints its first Black trustee.
2001 Ruth Simmons becomes the first African American president of an Ivy League university.
2002 Toshika Hudson, Lesjanusar "Sha" Peterson, Geneive Hardney, Renee Hypolite, Natosha Mitchell, Jamey McCloud and Adrienne Watson become the first African American women to graduate from The Citadel as members of the Corps of Cadets. Dr. Richard King becomes to first African American graduate of the Baylor University M.D./Ph.D. program (Neuroscience). King is also the recipient of the program's first Richard R. Dickason, Jr. M.D./Ph.D. Outstanding Physician Scientist Award. Black Princeton University students Shena Elrington '04, Ayana Harry '06, Brittani Kirkpatrick '05 and Brandon Nicholson '05 form the Committee for the Improvement for African American Life to draw attention to the unique issues facing African American students at the University. In June of this year the College Board unanimously approves dramatic changes to the SAT, including the elimination of analogy questions in the Verbal section, and the addition of a third written portion of the exam.
2003 Christopher Edley, Jr., a former Harvard law professor and special counsel to President Bill Clinton, becomes the first African American dean of Boalt Hall, the law school of the University of California at Berkeley. In Grutter v. Bollinger, the Supreme, in a 5-4 decision, upholds the University of Michigan Law School's affirmative action policy, recognizing the institutions "compelling interest in obtaining the education benefits that flow from a diverse student body." The Center for Africana Studies is established at the Johns Hopkins University.
2004 On September 9th of this year Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine dedicates a new "state-of-the-art"auditorium and atrium to it's first Black graduate and faculty member. Dr. Daniel Hale Williams. The auditorium, which cost over $35 million to complete, provides more than 160, 000 square feet of space. On October 22nd of the year, Galludet University dedicates the newly renovated Andrew J. Foster Auditorium, named in honor of their first Black graduate. Tony Robinson, a senior, becomes the first African American editor-in-chief of the Daily Iowan, University of Iowa's student-run daily newspaper. On October 26th of this year, Columbia University dedicates a plaza on its Morningside campus in the name of it's first Black trustee, the late Rev. Dr. M. Moran Weston, a graduate of the class of 1930.
2005 On April 17 of this year, Dave Leitao is named as the new head coach of the men's varsity basketball team at the University of Virginia, and thus becomes the first African American head coach of any varsity sport at UVA. Howard University's Hilltop becomes the United States' first and only Black college daily newspaper.
2006 Paulette McCrae becomes the first African American to earn a Ph.D. in neuroscience from Yale University.
