Discuss Detroit » Archives - July 2008 » Lewis College of Business, Detroit « Previous Next »
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Ladia
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Username: Ladia

Post Number: 93
Registered: 05-2008
Posted on Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 5:13 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I heard that Michigan's only and last historically black college is about to close.The Lewis family became corrupt,misused student financial aide money,didn't pay their teachers and staff,lost accredidation,and last summer graduated the last 5 students they had left.
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Dtowncitylover
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Username: Dtowncitylover

Post Number: 278
Registered: 02-2008
Posted on Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 5:21 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

That's too bad. :-(
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Detroitrise
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Username: Detroitrise

Post Number: 3515
Registered: 09-2007
Posted on Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 5:22 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Shame...

I'm all for entrepreneurship & independently-owned places, but this is the type of stuff that makes me avoid them.
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Ladia
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Username: Ladia

Post Number: 95
Registered: 05-2008
Posted on Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 5:26 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

My paternal grandmother went there back in the 50's. The school has mainly only been open for people to get their transcripts,since they lost their accredidation many students left. Lewis couldn't compete with the much cheaper community colleges also.The Lewis family seemed to be infighting and played musical chairs with leadership.Lewis was one of the first collges my grandmother went to because back in those days blacks couldn't get into many colleges,in the large numbers they have now.
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Professorscott
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Username: Professorscott

Post Number: 1601
Registered: 12-2006
Posted on Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 5:43 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

The strange thing is, their web site gives no indication that anything unusual is afoot, other than that the financial aid pages are "under construction".

Here's a very odd snippet of information, from the web site: "During the past 70 years, over 2,500 students have graduated from Lewis College of Business, and close to 27,000 students have attended this institution."

So they've graduated less than 10% of their students over their entire history? That sounds like a very unusually bad ratio, unless I'm reading this incorrectly.

The loss of accreditation, one year ago this month, is what finally drove home the dagger, but I don't recall exactly what led to that loss.
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Ladia
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Username: Ladia

Post Number: 98
Registered: 05-2008
Posted on Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 6:04 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

The school has been in denial.They lost their accredidation because they lost many students,and the school was outdated still teaching like it was the 1970's,when most other colleges were more high tech with online blackboard's etc,they still did everything by hand.they would hire staff,not telling them they wouldn't get paid,so then the staff would leave.the staff offices would be fixed nicely while the student areas would be ru down,staff bathrooms nice while student bathrooms run down.i heard the original owner and her kids did well with the school,then the grandkids got ahold of it and didn't do well.the lewis family would also have their own family in top positions who were not qualified,and got paid alot while the staff with ph. d's got little money.the financial aide department was also screwed up going back years.
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Ladia
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Username: Ladia

Post Number: 99
Registered: 05-2008
Posted on Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 6:09 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

lewis used to have business luncheons every thursday that were open to the public,so i used to go to those,they haven't had them since the school has been collapsing.

the higher learning commission who gives schools accredidation said that lewis was supposed to let its students know that they were in danger of losing accredidation,lewis kept it hidden,students found out on their own,and things almost became violent there last year.lewis was trying to get more students to come,not telling th students about the school's problems.
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Charlottepaul
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Username: Charlottepaul

Post Number: 2645
Registered: 10-2006
Posted on Saturday, August 30, 2008 - 9:25 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

"lewis was trying to get more students to come,not telling th students about the school's problems."

Sounds like a very well run family. Who cares. This school should close with people like that. This school is in Midtown near CCS, right?
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Professorscott
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Username: Professorscott

Post Number: 1602
Registered: 12-2006
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 12:41 am:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

No, it was on the northwest side, something like Meyers and Curtis, or near there anyway.
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Foxyscholar
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Username: Foxyscholar

Post Number: 223
Registered: 12-2007
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 9:53 am:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

For a course project I did a organizational analysis of LCB. As a Black female, I was FASCINATED by what the founder put together during the 1920s, 30s, 40s, civil rights movement, so on and so forth. Things changed after the founder passed. After reading my paper, my professor put it in the following words: "it's rotting from the inside"...not necessarily from mismanagement, but from the inability or unwillingness to adjust to the changing economic and educational times.

Think about it: prior to integration/forced desegregation, Blacks could not go to historically White institutions. So after Brown v. Board in 1954, it opened up access for Blacks to go to White colleges/universities. Some Black folk think the White person's ice is colder, so they forsook the offerings from Black colleges like LCB and thus the result.
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Detx
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Username: Detx

Post Number: 181
Registered: 07-2007
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 4:11 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Sounds like typical Detroit style mismanagement.
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Ladia
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Username: Ladia

Post Number: 105
Registered: 05-2008
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 4:24 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

The school is on Meyers, between curtis and six mile.

foxy scholar,did you do your project on LCB recently,and for what school?
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Foxyscholar
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Username: Foxyscholar

Post Number: 224
Registered: 12-2007
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 5:40 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Hello, Ladia:

The resulting series of papers were for a course project in Spring/Summer 2006. The course was Organizational Theory in my Educational Leadership program at EMU.

I examined documents and photographs available online and as provided by the institution. I interviewed interim president/senior administrator Frank Gillespie, who graciously gave me a copy of the autobiography of the founder, Violet Temple Harrison Lewis. I explored the two buildings that made up the campus (at the Meyers/Wyoming location). I literally walked around both buildings, looked at classrooms, ceilings, carpet, equipment, cars in the parking lot, taking notes on what I observed.

I wrote three papers on the following organizational levels: institutional (from the school's perspective), local/regional, and state/national, looking at culture, political conflict, nature of the polity, and policy formation. We had to include a personal response to each paper. Here's what I wrote for one of the papers:

Personal Response
I wonder what I would do if I were in the president’s seat of this institution, recognizing how deep the culture is ingrained. The assumptions, myths, beliefs, and values are so sacred to the longtime members; change of any kind might not be permitted. The contrast between Lewis College of Business in the mid-20th century and the early 21st century is profound. It is as if that as much as things change, they stay the same. Lewis College of Business “stayed the same” throughout its existence to date, making minor adjustments in a reactionary versus a responsive mode. When founder Violet Lewis died in 1968, so did the ingenuity that would be needed to usher the institution into a post-Jim Crow era. It seems as if future leaders of the school were unprepared, ill equipped, or frightened to make the difficult or unconventional decisions to respond to the changes that come from policy change, population shifts, and technological advancement. I think that the leaders at Lewis College of Business would say that they have made significant changes to adjust to the dynamic environment. However, if the measurement of change is based on the intensity and precision of the changes in the recent past, I speculate that this institution may not be in existence to commemorate 80 years of service in 2009.
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Charlottepaul
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Username: Charlottepaul

Post Number: 2651
Registered: 10-2006
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 6:52 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Oops. I guess this is what I was thinking of:
http://img.groundspeak.com/way marking/display/ec30ac95-d0d8- 4905-ba15-8cbe22d79b20.jpg
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Foxyscholar
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Username: Foxyscholar

Post Number: 225
Registered: 12-2007
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 7:11 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Charlottepaul, that's the historical marker, located near John R and Ferry St. Here's what I wrote about that location in my paper:

In less than a year’s time after the Detroit branch of Lewis Business College started in 1941, student enrollments had outgrown its space, thanks to Detroit’s automotive and military production boom. Just as she had done in Indianapolis, Lewis set out to purchase a home to house both the school and a residence for herself and her two daughters. (She had since divorced her husband by this time). The property needed to be centrally located to accommodate the students coming from different areas of the city.

Between the increasing student enrollments and the eventual purchase of a home (priced at $10,000) in a prestigious section (read: predominantly White, described as “refined, genteel, and Caucasian”) of the city (now known as Detroit’s Cultural Center), Lewis Business College inadvertently garnered some undesirable attention.

Since Lewis used her residence to accommodate her school, a “for-profit” business, the neighborhood’s White citizens filed a petition against Lewis for violation of a zoning ordinance; this action was legal grounds for eviction. In a sprint of research and strategy sessions with Black community leaders (including clergy and civil rights activists), it was decided that Lewis Business College should be incorporated as a non-profit organization. This process included the development and submission of corporate papers (outlining a corporate name, statement of purpose and bylaws). In 1942, the school was incorporated under the following name: “Lewis Association for the Study and Practical Application of Business and Commercial Science”, with the assumed name of Lewis Business College. The school operated out of this home from 1941 to 1976 when it relocated to its current (and largest) location in northwest Detroit.
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Ladia
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Username: Ladia

Post Number: 108
Registered: 05-2008
Posted on Monday, September 01, 2008 - 7:46 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I also read the boo written by the founder.The school should have changed with the times,instead of being stuck in the 70's.

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