The House Wednesday morning approved a bill that would make Central State University a land grant university.
The provision, included in the five-year farm bill, passed by a 251-166 vote.
Central State has sought land-grant status since 1890, when the federal government named more than a dozen historically black colleges and universities as land grant colleges. The designation means that schools are tasked with teaching practical agriculture, science, military science and engineering, but also makes schools eligible for federal dollars. Central State President Cynthia Jackson-Hammond said it will also help encourage research and new partnerships with other land grand colleges.She also said it would help as a recruitment tool for the university. The only other land grant institution in Ohio is Ohio State University.
"We are ecstatic," she said.
Reps. Mike Turner, R-Dayton, Marcia Fudge, D-Cleveland and Joyce Beatty, D-Jefferson Township were among those who worked on the measure in the House, though other members of the Ohio delegation cosponsored an amendment to designate Central State as a land grant institution or signed a letter supporting the move. Beatty is a Central State alumni. In the Senate, Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, spearheaded the effort. Fudge and Brown were members of the Senate-House committee that crafted the final legislation, which now goes to the Senate.
"As Ohio's only public Historically Black College and University, this designation is long overdue," Turner said. "When CSU first sought land grant status over 120 years ago, it was intense political wrangling that denied CSU this designation. It is fitting that my Ohio colleagues in both the House and the Senate worked on a bipartisan, bicameral basis to see this through."