“Africans must begin to see themselves as agents of history and not as the passive victims of someone else’s history.” — Dr. John Henrik Clarke

As Sudan descends deeper into civil war, the future of its children hangs in the balance. More than 19 million school-aged Sudanese children are currently out of school—the highest number ever recorded for the country. This is not just an educational crisis. It is a generational collapse. With one of the youngest populations in the world, Sudan faces the grim reality of growing up without schooling, literacy, or the safety and stability that schools often provide.

At the same time, across the Atlantic, Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) possess a legacy uniquely shaped by resistance to exclusion, structural racism, and underfunding. These institutions—built by and for African Americans during a time when education was denied—know better than most the critical role education plays in empowering oppressed people. HBCUs now stand at a rare intersection of moral responsibility and institutional opportunity to contribute globally, beginning with a bold initiative: to help rebuild the future of Sudan’s children.

This article explores the critical ways in which HBCU education departments can support Sudan’s children, from developing culturally responsive teacher training programs to launching Pan-African digital learning infrastructure, to advocating for new global education aid frameworks that center African-led solutions.

Context: The Collapse of Education in Sudan

Since the start of the conflict in April 2023 between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the war has left hundreds of thousands dead, displaced over 8 million people, and shuttered more than 10,000 schools across the country. Before the war, Sudan was already grappling with a fragile education system: under-resourced, overcrowded, and plagued by systemic poverty. According to UNICEF, even before the latest civil war, 7 million children were out of school.

Now, with over 19 million out of school, the crisis is unprecedented. Some areas like Darfur and Khartoum have seen the destruction of schools entirely. Teachers have fled. Textbooks have been lost or burned. There is no funding for school meals or mental health support. A generation of children has now gone more than two years without access to education. And these are not just lost school years—these are the crucial years for development, for acquiring basic literacy, for learning numeracy, and for cultivating citizenship.

Compounding the emergency is the psychological toll. The war has introduced widespread trauma into the lives of children. Many have lost parents, witnessed atrocities, or been recruited as child soldiers. Education is more than academic for these children—it is potentially lifesaving.

Why HBCUs?

HBCUs were themselves born from the ashes of conflict, birthed in a country that had just emerged from slavery and was in the midst of the violent Reconstruction era. They were created to serve Black communities that were denied the right to learn, teach, or lead. In many ways, HBCUs are one of the clearest institutional analogs to what Sudan’s communities need now: resilient, grassroots educational institutions rooted in justice and cultural pride.

Moreover, HBCUs are more than their past. They are modern-day global actors with deep expertise in teacher education, online learning, community-centered pedagogy, and culturally relevant curriculum. Education departments at institutions like Howard University, Spelman College, Tuskegee University, and North Carolina A&T produce hundreds of new Black educators annually and train leaders who know how to work in under-resourced communities with systemic trauma and political neglect.

Sudan’s crisis is the type of global emergency where HBCUs can—and should—step up.

Strategic Areas of Intervention

1. Digital Infrastructure and Remote Learning

With Sudan’s education infrastructure decimated, online learning is one of the few viable paths forward. HBCUs can:

• Develop open-source virtual learning modules that can be accessed via smartphones and solar-powered devices, which are already being distributed by organizations like UNICEF.
• Partner with African ed-tech startups to create platforms with culturally responsive content.
• Provide virtual tutoring and mentoring programs with HBCU students volunteering time to work with displaced Sudanese children in refugee camps.
• Partner with innovative HBCU K–12 demonstration schools like Southern University Laboratory School—a leader in blending culturally responsive pedagogy with digital innovation—to deliver flexible, high-quality education across refugee camps and conflict zones.
• Provide virtual tutoring and mentoring programs with HBCU students volunteering time to work with displaced Sudanese children via platforms like WhatsApp, Telegram, and localized apps with offline functionality.

Clark Atlanta University, through its School of Education’s existing digital literacy programs, could be a flagship HBCU to build and lead a pilot platform—“PanAfricanLearn”—a mobile-first digital classroom initiative tailored for conflict zones.

2. Teacher Training and Capacity Building

HBCUs are experienced in producing teachers who are trained to serve in underserved and overburdened environments. In partnership with NGOs on the ground, HBCUs can:

• Launch certificate programs in trauma-informed teaching practices via Zoom, WhatsApp, and other low-bandwidth platforms.
• Develop African and regional-language learning toolkits for early childhood educators in refugee camps.
• Provide train-the-trainer programs that allow a single trained teacher to replicate their training across dozens of displaced communities.

Imagine the College of Education at Florida A&M establishing a Sudan Teacher Fellows Program that trains 100 local educators over 18 months to serve 30,000 children in displaced camps.

3. Curriculum and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy

What children learn is as important as whether they learn at all. A culturally relevant curriculum can build resilience, self-worth, and historical awareness. HBCUs can support:

• The design of history and civic education modules that affirm Sudanese identity, diversity, and shared memory.
• Gender-sensitive and trauma-informed content to counteract war-related psychological harm.
• Modules rooted in Pan-African identity formation, drawing from HBCU research centers and archives on Pan-African history.

HBCUs like Howard’s School of Education and its African Studies department could collaborate to design curricula that center Sudanese children’s lived experiences and protect their psychological well-being.

4. Higher Education Pipelines and Scholarships

Sudan’s youth are not only out of school—they are locked out of higher education entirely. HBCUs can:

• Establish Pan-African scholarships for Sudanese youth displaced by conflict.
• Create accelerated bridge programs for Sudanese high school graduates who missed key years of schooling.
• Develop articulation agreements with universities in Kenya, Egypt, South Africa, and Nigeria to serve as stepping stones for Sudanese students to access HBCU opportunities.

HBCUs can also develop a Pan-African Scholars Program in conjunction with the African Union and the African Development Bank.

5. Policy Research and Global Advocacy

The educational crisis in Sudan must be met with global political will. HBCUs can:

• Conduct policy research on educational displacement and publish position papers to influence African Union, UNESCO, and U.S. Department of State funding priorities.
• Serve as academic consultants to international donors to ensure resources go to African-led education initiatives.
• Host annual international convenings on conflict and education, centering Sudanese voices and African educational sovereignty.

Southern University Law Center or Howard Law School could also lead legal advocacy research around the right to education in conflict under international law.

Institutional Partnerships: A Model of Pan-African Collaboration

The success of this vision will depend on coalition-building. HBCUs should not act alone, but through intentional alliances. Suggested partners include:

• UNICEF Sudan and Education Cannot Wait – to provide field implementation and emergency educational logistics.
• Sudanese Teachers’ Union (in exile) – to co-design programs grounded in Sudanese pedagogy and local language access.
• Southern University Laboratory School – to serve as a model and partner for early childhood and K–12 curriculum design and teacher training, with scalable tools for trauma-informed pedagogy in post-conflict settings.
• African Development Bank – to fund the development of HBCU-supported digital platforms and school reconstruction infrastructure.
• Open Society Foundations & Mellon Foundation – for supporting Black- and African-led educational models and emergency cultural heritage preservation in Sudan.
• University of Khartoum (diaspora faculty) – to assist in rebuilding academic institutions and higher education linkages.
• HBCU Faculty Development Network (HBCU-FDN) – to coordinate faculty engagement, professional development, and the deployment of expertise across HBCUs working on Sudan’s education crisis.

The HBCU Faculty Development Network, long committed to strengthening teaching, scholarship, and service among HBCU faculty, can act as the central convening body to align resources, disseminate culturally relevant curriculum, and offer coordinated virtual training for Sudanese educators. Through its existing framework, HBCU-FDN can:

• Mobilize HBCU faculty as visiting virtual lecturers or trainers for displaced Sudanese teachers.
• Host professional development workshops across campuses to prepare HBCU educators for global service in conflict and post-conflict educational contexts.
• Create research fellowships for HBCU faculty working on Pan-African educational recovery.

Together, these institutions can form the basis of a Pan-African Education Recovery Coalition (PERC), co-led by HBCUs, African universities, and regional teacher unions. This body would serve as a long-term platform for rebuilding education in Sudan and eventually in other conflict-affected parts of Africa.dy.

A Caution on Global Power Dynamics

It is critical to acknowledge that many of the existing global educational interventions in Africa are dominated by Euro-American institutions with extractive tendencies. Western universities receive massive grants to “study” African crises, while African institutions and communities remain underfunded and underconsulted.

HBCUs must enter this work with humility, integrity, and a commitment to authentic partnership—not saviorism. The goal is not for HBCUs to lead Sudan’s recovery, but to support Sudanese educators in leading their own.

Political Realities: Navigating Hostile U.S. and Global Climates

Today’s U.S. political environment, particularly under a MAGA-led federal government, is openly hostile to foreign aid, especially to African nations. Moreover, Southern states—the traditional home of many HBCUs—may not support international engagement through public funding.

As such, HBCUs must explore alternative strategies:

• Leverage Private Philanthropy: Seek funding from Pan-African aligned organizations like the Mo Ibrahim Foundation or Black-led philanthropic networks.
• Form Independent HBCU Consortia: Use existing frameworks like the Thurgood Marshall College Fund to form education coalitions focused on international solidarity.
• Partner with African Union: Bypass traditional USAID bureaucracies by forming direct agreements with the African Union Education Cluster.

These actions will allow HBCUs to act globally even amid domestic political resistance.

A Vision for the Future: A Diasporic Education Accord

Imagine a world where HBCUs, African universities, and the African Diaspora operate under a Pan-African Education Accord. Under such an agreement:

• Every major educational crisis in Africa triggers a coordinated response by HBCU education departments.
• HBCU students earn credit by participating in cross-border educational service.
• African and African Diaspora educators share curricula, research, and teacher exchanges as part of a common destiny.

Sudan would be the beginning—but not the end—of that vision. And this generation of Sudanese children could be the first to benefit from an unapologetically Pan-African global education movement.

Final Thought: Our Shared Responsibility

The 19 million Sudanese children out of school today may never know the names of Mary McLeod Bethune or Booker T. Washington. But their struggles mirror the very reasons these leaders built institutions like Bethune-Cookman and Tuskegee.

In 1900, Black children in Alabama lacked schools, books, or trained teachers. But HBCUs answered the call then. And now, in 2025, the children of Sudan—displaced, traumatized, and cut off from learning—deserve the same kind of institutional response.

Let us not watch another generation of African children fade into oblivion.

Let HBCUs rise again—not just for African Americans, but for Africa itself.