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by Dr. Boyce Watkins
Dr. Dre is one of the most successful entertainers in history, earning hundreds of millions of dollars by making great music. Much of this music moves because he has been able to successfully package urban/black culture, selling it to audiences around the world. During a recent public debate I had at Brown University with Michael Eric Dyson over the impact of violent hip-hop, I can say that I gave Dr. Dre an admittedly questionable pass. While he and NWA are certainly the founders of “gangsta” rap that glorifies violence in urban communities, their music possessed a kind of social conscience that is rarely seen in the bastardized, toxic, corporate-sponsored, genocidal brainwashing that we hear being promoted by white-owned companies like BET today.
But despite the fact that Dre’s messages are not as harmful as what we’re seeing a generation later, it cannot be denied that he is the grandfather of much of the music that we’re hearing on the radio right now. The black community has paid a huge price for supporting Dr. Dre in his quest to become the first hip-hop billionaire, there’s no question about that. So, what we might ask those who readily use their blackness for profit is the following: What are you giving back to those who gave you so much?
It’s hard to know exactly what Dr. Dre is doing for the black community, but we all know where he made his greatest gift. Dr. Dre and music producer Jimmy Iovine recently announced a whopping $70 million dollar donation to USC to create a new degree. The program is one that pulls together liberal arts, graphic arts, business, music and technology. Dr. Dre’s donation is the largest ever given by any African American in history, and oddly enough, the money is going into the hands of rich white people.
As I prepared to give the commencement address at Simmons College, a growing HBCU in Kentucky with a very rich history, I heard a story about a group of ex-slaves who pooled their money to buy four acres of land so they could educate future generations. Without sacrifices like these, the school would not be giving so much to the community today. The school’s extraordinary president, Dr. Kevin Cosby, has not taken a paycheck for his work for the last eight years and readily speaks of how the school is located in one of the poorest districts in America. He sees his contribution as a chance to lift up the community around him, rather than simply milk the community’s resources.
If I could transplant Dr. Cosby’s brain into Dr. Dre’s body, black America would be changed forever. Also, had those ex-slaves been naive enough to give all of their money to the big white university down the street, the impact of their contribution would be minimal at best. One of the reasons that black Americans struggle financially is because we’ve been locked out of economic opportunities, while massive institutions like USC hoard the wealth to protect their own (take a look at the very low percentage of African Americans they hire or admit as non-athletic students). Simultaneously, when we do have access to the resources necessary to begin our building process, we don’t feel inclined to support those who look like us. That’s one key difference between the black and the Jewish communities (as Min. Louis Farrakhan pointed out at our New Paradigm forum last year): They teach their children to generously target their resources to protect them against oppression.
Some may argue that Dr. Dre can do whatever he wants with his money, and this point is valid: No one has the right to tell any of us what to do – a child has no obligation to care about his mother, a husband has no real obligation to provide for his wife, a father has no obligation to protect his children, the list goes on and on. But the truth is that if you choose not to care about your community, then don’t expect your community to care about you. Black people have always been incredibly loyal and supportive of Dr. Dre, particularly those who made him the defacto King of Compton and Long Beach. It would seem that his greatest economic gift should go to them instead.
Another person who had something to say about the gift is Dillard University president, Walter M. Kimbrough. Dr. Kimbrough was once the youngest president of any HBCU in the country and proudly considers himself to be a part of the hip-hop generation. In an op-ed in the LA Times, Kimbrough openly asks Dre why he chose to give so much money to USC, as opposed to one of the struggling HBCUs that really could have used those resources:
I understood their need to build a pool of skilled talent. But why at USC? Iovine’s daughter is an alum, sure. And he just gave its commencement address. Andre Young — before he was Dr. Dre — grew up in nearby Compton, where he rose to fame as part of the rap group N.W.A. The Beats headquarters are on L.A.’s Westside.
Still, what if Dre had given $35 million — his half of the USC gift and about 10% of his wealth, according to a Forbes estimate — to an institution that enrolls the very people who supported his career from the beginning? An institution where the majority of students are low-income? A place where $35 million would represent a truly transformational gift?
Dr. Kimbrough is absolutely correct. USC’s endowment is over $3.5 billion, which gives this school more money than every single HBCU in America combined (please re-read that last sentence very carefully). Even more stunning is that the school’s endowment isn’t even in the top 20 in the nation. The point here, and I hope Dr. Dre understands this, is that white people have plenty of money and they aren’t going to use that money to help people who look like you. They don’t exactly need black people making donations, since they’ve already earned over a billion dollars from their African American athletes, many of whom have mothers who can’t even pay the rent.
Even worse is that much of this wealth was accumulated on the backs of slaves and black people who were locked out of the economic system. Schools like USC make it diffcult for black students to gain admission and even more difficult for black faculty to get jobs. The university sits down the street from South Central Los Angeles, a virtual war zone where prisons and funeral homes get rich from all the young black men being fed into the prison industrial complex. USC doesn’t use many of its resources to help these individuals, it simply uses Dr. Dre’s money to build higher walls so they can protect the rich white kids from the scary black ones.
Black students at USC protest police harassment during a recent party on campus
I wonder if Dr. Dre knows that not only does USC admit very few black students, but the ones who are there are subject to serious racism and racial profiling. During a recent campus party, the LAPD sent over 70 police officers in riot gear with a helicopter to break up the party after noise complaints. All the while, the white kids were partying up in their fraternity houses without so much as a peep from the police.
Additionally, for Dr. Dre, his $35 million dollar donation (half of the $70 million he is sharing with Iovin) is merely a drop in the bucket for a school like USC that is sitting on an amount of money that no HBCU will have for at least another 100 years. USC shed no tears when Dr. Dre’s baby brother was a victim of the violence that has poisoned the black community. They did nothing when his son died from an overdose on the drugs that were dropped into black communities in the 1980s. HBCUs have scholars working to solve these problems, and thousands of students who will graduate to fight for black America. USC does NOT. Other than a token scholar here or there, USC’s faculty are working to solve problems for white people, not black ones. That’s just a fact.
Dr. Kimbrough goes even further to explain why USC was a questionable donation target for someone who grew up as a struggling black kid in South Central Los Angeles.
USC is a great institution, no question. But it has a $3.5-billion endowment, the 21st largest in the nation and much more than every black college — combined. Less than 20% of USC’s student body qualifies for federal Pell Grants, given to students from low-income families, compared with two-thirds of those enrolled at black colleges. USC has also seen a steady decrease in black student enrollment, which is now below 5%.
A new report on black male athletes and racial inequities shows that only 2.2% of USC undergrads are black men, compared with 56% of its football and basketball teams, one of the largest disparities in the nation. And given USC’s $45,602 tuition next year, I’m confident Dre could have sponsored multiple full-ride scholarships to private black colleges for the cost of one at USC.
Dr. Kimbrough made a courageous decision to write this article. There are some who might criticize him as a “hater” or argue with his right to question what Dr. Dre does with his money. But I’m not talking to those people right now. I’m actually speaking to those who understand that the circle of economic life in any community is a recursive process, in which all who benefit are expected to contribute. When a corporation moves into a city and extracts income from that city, it is expected to give back to the city in tax revenues, jobs and charitable contributions. So, when rappers soak up resources by promoting harmful, violent and even buffoonish stereotypes of black men and women to the world (the kind that may make police see black men as threats), they too should be expected to give something to the community from which they’ve taken so much.
We have to look at the facts: Dr. Dre, a man who has made hundreds of millions of dollars selling back urban culture to the world has made his largest donation to a predominately white university that doesn’t need the money and rarely admits black students unless they play a sport. I love Dr. Dre’s music, but I am dying to ask my good brother, “What were you thinking?”
By the way, as schools like USC have gotten rich from black athletes, HBCUs can barely pay the bills. All the while, almost none of this money is returned to the black community, and multi-million dollar USC athletes like Reggie Bush have their integrity questioned for receiving a few hundred dollars under the table. The fact is that these schools rob black people blind, don’t give hardly anything to the black community, and laugh at the fact that we are ridiculous enough to turn around and give money back. If I were the president of USC, I’d be giggling under my breath and wondering how a group of people can have such little respect for themselves.
This incident reminds me of a famous quote by the late Malcolm X. He’s speaking about the Democratic Party, but the quote is applicable to any group or organization that we support without demanding reciprocity from that institution. Here’s what he said:
“You put them first and they put you last. ‘Cause you’re a chump. A political chump!…Any time you throw your weight behind a political party that controls two-thirds of the government, and that party can’t keep the promise that it made to you during election time, and you are dumb enough to walk around continuing to identify yourself with that party, you’re not only a chump but you’re a traitor to your race.”
So, with that being said, we can ask: We know what the black community has done for Dr. Dre. We know what Dr. Dre has done for USC. But what has USC done for the community that built Dr. Dre’s entire career? I would argue that the answer to this question is self-explanatory. Giving your all to any institution or organization without demanding reciprocity is symptomatic of low self-esteem. So, when African Americans support entertainers without expecting these entertainers to reciprocate, it is a reminder that, deep down, we don’t believe that we deserve to be respected.
Dr. Dre is a brilliant producer, but this move just doesn’t make any sense. I hope he has something to say, and I applaud Dr. Kimbrough for being one of the few campus presidents with the courage to engage in such an honest and necessary dialogue. Otherwise, to black people who have enough sense to understand what I’m saying in this article, let’s please maintain at least enough self-respect to support our own community before we start transferring our wealth into the hands of those who are living off of the money stolen from our ancestors. Our children need love too.
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I find Dillard University's President, Dr Walter M Kimbrough's comments to be quite astute. I view the donation to USC, opposed to an HBCU, as being considered a politically correct move, probably recommended by the staff that he has. It appears as if he has forgotten the original crowd of followers NWA had was the black community itself. (predominately) and he eventually crossed over to other races and cultures through time. I think that he did what he did to appease the majority white APPLE community, to promote sales of his purchased product. Which is, indirectly a sellout. j/s
With a visionary gift from music-industry leaders Jimmy Iovine and Andre Young, the University of Southern California is establishing a new academy to inspire innovative, entrepreneurial thought in business, design, marketing and the arts.
Conceived as a collaborative environment that brings multidisciplinary students, instructors and professional mentors together, the USC Jimmy Iovine and Andre Young Academy for Arts, Technology and the Business of Innovation will be a transformational presence on one of the nation’s most dynamic university campuses.
The focus is on invention and conceptual thinking, drawing on the talents and influences of leaders from across industries to empower the next generation of disruptive inventors and professional thought leaders across a multitude of global industries.
Jimmy Iovine, the Chairman of Universal Music Group’s Interscope Geffen A&M Records unit, and co-founder of Beats Electronics is one of the music industry’s most accomplished and respected leaders. Iovine began his four-decade career as a recording engineer, working with the likes of John Lennon and Bruce Springsteen. As record producer, he was instrumental in the career breakthroughs of artists such as Patti Smith, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, and U2, as well as Stevie Nicks, Dire Straits and The Pretenders.
Iovine co-founded Interscope records in 1990, widely regarded as the home of music’s greatest artists, including Dr. Dre, Nine Inch Nails, U2, Mary J. Blige, No Doubt, Marilyn Manson, The Black Eyed Peas, Eminem, 50 Cent and Lady Gaga. In 2006, Iovine and hip-hop pioneer/producer Dr. Dre co-founded Beats Electronics, a high-performance headphone and sound transmission company intent on recapturing the fidelity of the studio. With its expansion into smart phones and car audio systems, today Beats by Dr. Dre has captured 40 percent market share of the entire billion-dollar headphones industry. Since 2011, Iovine has shared his insight and expertise with contestants on Fox’s ratings blockbuster American Idol.
Born Andre Young in Compton, Calif., artist, producer and entrepreneur Dr. Dre began his career as a member of the World Class Wreckin’ Cru. In 1986, he co-founded N.W.A. and won critical and commercial acclaim with the group’s 1988 landmark rap album Straight Outta Compton. In 1992, Dre released his solo debut, the G-Funk masterpiece The Chronic, which Rolling Stone hailed as one of the greatest albums ever made. In 1993, Dre produced the solo debut of rapper Snoop Dogg, which spawned the worldwide hip-hop hit, “Gin and Juice.”
With the launch of his own record company, Aftermath Entertainment in 1996, Dre went on to discover and nurture such next-generation hip hop superstars as 50 Cent, The Game, Kendrick Lamar and Eminem. With Interscope chief Iovine, Dre created Beats By Dr. Dre — intent on recapturing the fidelity of the studio in an age of ear buds and tiny laptop speakers. Launched in 2008 with the revolutionary Studio headphones, which have become culturally iconic — the signature red B now an instantly recognizable and respected symbol. In 2009, Beats by Dr. Dre partnered with HP to produce the HP Envy notebook, integrated with BeatsAudio, followed by the Beatbox iPod dock. In 2011, the company Electronics opened a flagship retail store in New York City’s SoHo district where each of its new products is introduced.
“The vision and generosity of Jimmy Iovine and Andre Young will profoundly influence the way all of us perceive and experience artistic media. USC provides an extraordinarily rich academic, research and artistic environment. We are committed to encouraging our students to use their intellectual and creative resources to effect change in all segments of society. Our goal is to ensure that the Academy is the most collaborative educational program in the world.”
—USC President C. L. Max Nikias
USC’s strategic location in Los Angeles, widely viewed as the creative and media capital of the world, provides an unrivaled opportunity for students to take advantage of a living laboratory where music, film and visual arts are deeply intertwined. In addition, the university’s proximity to the city’s burgeoning “Silicon Beach” as well as Northern California’s Silicon Valley provides access to a vast array of technological advances from which students can draw inspiration.
The Academy will enroll its first class of 25 students in fall 2014. Applicants will be accepted based on a rigorous review process encompassing demonstrated academic excellence as well as proven ability for original thought. Students who complete a course of study in the Academy will graduate with a degree that recognizes each individual’s ability to truly engage and to succeed in an educational experience that is constantly asking the question, “Why not?”
The Academy aims to instill in its students an entirely new way of thinking. To accomplish this, the program offers a highly select group of students an integrated, four-year course of study that provides in-depth learning in three essential areas: art and design; engineering and computer science; and business and venture management. Team-taught interdisciplinary courses have been developed and adapted specifically for the program, offering an unprecedented undergraduate education that empowers the imagination and hastens creative solutions.
Through the Academy’s core students learn to think seamlessly across multiple disciplines, and envision possibilities from every perspective. A series of interdependent courses helps students to gain understanding of the theories, concepts, vocabulary and ‘language’ common to each area, and to garner skills in their relevant applied technologies and techniques.
The Academy’s strong focus on the arts and arts-based practices is present at every level of the core. Aesthetics, critical discernment, and an understanding of global culture are considered core competencies for every Academy graduate, as is the ability to analyze and critique existing systems, services, or products. Courses on innovation look at the social and cultural changes that stem from disruption, and survey the growing roster of ideas that have forever altered business, industry, the arts, and the way we live. A broad look into the very nature of creativity and ideation also looks at audio/visual perception, and design as a universal language with unique, problem-solving capabilities.
Additionally, skills-based courses offer instruction in leading creative, analytical, and presentation software; techniques for rapid visualization and rendering; coding and programming; electronic prototyping; feasibility; marketplace assessment; making and manufacturing; financing; and more.
From the very first week, students are challenged to integrate all they are learning into creative practice, particularly through an interactive workshop series known as “The Innovator’s Forum.” In this setting, students meet, hear, and work with innovators from the arts, industry, business, and the public sphere in guided exercises geared toward building a variety of essential skills including: leadership; written, oral, and visual communication; critical thinking; problem solving; adaptability and agility; and building and working effectively in teams.
In addition to the core, in years two and three students choose from a variety of curricular emphases that serve to tailor each student’s experience to his or her individual strengths or desired path. Current emphases include curated experiences in Visual Design, Audio Design, Venture Management, Technology, and Communication, but it is expected that this list will grow quickly to encompass a number of additional areas at USC.
Emphases may be used to enhance or strengthen existing skills with advanced knowledge or applications, or to add a new area of focus. Through academic guidance and advisement, students may also create unique emphases by selecting a course of study from across all of the Academy’s offerings, or from offerings in other schools or academic units at USC.
Advanced skills taught through the Academy’s emphases include: color theory and visual perception; 2-D graphic design, including typography, and motion graphics; 3-D design in both actual and virtual spaces; materials and media in design; rapid-prototyping; web and interactive design; computer graphics and animation; advanced coding; cloud architecture and applications; mobile applications; audio capture and manipulation; live sound design; digital audio theory; acoustics and audio perception; consumer behavior, marketing and branding; project and operations management; financing the startup; business strategies; and more.
In year four, the student experience focuses on the Garage, the Academy’s collaborative creative space. In a unique environment that enhances creation with advanced design and prototyping technologies, students work in teams to realize their vision for the future. Throughout the year, students work in close collaboration with top faculty at USC and industry mentors selected from among the leaders in each relevant field or area. Aided by this expertise, students realize their ideas for new products, ventures, art forms, technologies, or services.
In March 2014, USC began construction of the Garage on the fourth floor of the Ronald Tutor Campus Center. The renderings below illustrate the planned facilities and dynamic workspaces the Academy will offer its first cohort in Fall 2014. Please note that the completed Garage may vary from these artist-produced designs.
Abundant, diverse workspace is essential for assembling and articulating a multipart product. Every aspect of the Garage is designed to accelerate your process – from concept to output.
Students have access to state-of-the-art rapid prototyping tools in the Garage. Production grade machines produce durable, thermoplastic prototypes with moving parts, while consumer grade machines are lightening-fast. Fused power 3-D modeling allows for complex forms at high resolution, and laser cutting enables a high quality surface finish to products.
The first year immerses the student immediately in the Academy’s philosophy and way of working. The Innovator’s Forum models the kind of thinking that the Academy seeks to instill in students, while courses in the history and impact of disruptive innovations guide students in making critical decisions about their future. Other courses present unique integrations of the three core areas, and combine the instruction of essential design and software-based skills with rapid visualization of ideas.
The second year of study is designed to strengthen the student’s skill set and cross-disciplinary thinking. Through advisement and input from faculty mentors, students identify the curricular emphases they will pursue while remaining firmly anchored in the Academy’s core through courses in computer coding and programming.
In year three the Academy’s core shifts to laying the necessary groundwork for the Garage. In addition to continued work in the emphases, a yearlong course teaches students to move an idea from concept through to creation and implementation. Students will vet actual proposals for the Garage with faculty and outside mentors, and begin to build project teams.
The Garage. As the Academy’s capstone requirement and the primary curricular focus for the senior year, the Garage is an intense and time-consuming experience for Academy students, and one that requires consistent dedication and commitment. Aided by faculty and team mentors, Garage teams are expected to create, test, develop, and present completed projects.
“The Academy’s core education will create a common, multi-lingual literacy and fluency across essential disciplines. This ‘big picture’ knowledge and skill will equip graduates with a leadership perspective that is unparalleled in an undergraduate degree, and that will be applicable to virtually any industry.”
—Erica Muhl, Inaugural Director of the USC Iovine Young Academy
and Dean of the USC Roski School of Fine Arts
Erica Muhl was appointed dean of the USC Roski School of Fine Arts, on May 1, 2013, after serving as interim dean since September 7, 2012. An accomplished composer, Muhl has received grants and awards from organizations such as the American Academy of Arts and Letters and National Endowment for the Arts, as well as the prestigious Whitaker Commissioning Prize. She has been awarded residencies and fellowships from, among others, Italy’s Civitella Ranieri Foundation, the Charles Ives Center for American Music, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, the American Academy in Rome, the Cultural Ministry of Venezuela, and the State of Saxony, Germany.
This documentary gives some insight of who Jimmie Iovine is and the origin of their relationship.
Just imagine our children when they finish school instead of having to go and beg white America for a job that pays them nothing, they have hundreds of black owned and black run companies to go to. To this day we all still have to be begging these people for stuff. It does not matter if you own your own business or not , I bet it was a white bank you got a loan from either to start or help when things were not going too well. Would it not be better if we had our own financial institutions to go to ? Just asking..We need to get off this way of thinking that white folks ice is colder that ours.
@ E Peters,, its not about who helped you when you were poor, that's the wrong way to look at it. That is that Clarence Thomas way of thinking that has us still in the mess we are in. First off god knows we are at the bottom of the barrel in this country and need all the help we can get. If it is you are saying that because Dre may not have received any help from that school so therefore he is not obligated to help now that he is rich, ok TRUE. However going by that way of thinking then one day if you find yourself or family member ,son or daughter in an accident where you are badly hurt in the street, then I hope you don`t mind everyone passing you by and not raising a finger to help. After all there is a pretty good chance those people YOU have never done anything for in the past. But something tells me you would like someone to stop and help you if you find yourself in that situation, so as Dre , Oprah, Thomas and the rest that feels that way..
Here is the thing, if Dre felt that the black school would not have done a good enough job, then build a school. He as the money and clout to do it.But instead he gives it to the same people that hate us and not too long ago had us working for free building them wealth. That I think is dumb A$$.
If only the blacks that has the money and power to really make a difference would stop being a bunch of self haters and cowards we would be in a far better place. Do you know what would happen if tomorrow Oprah and about 2 other wealthy famous blacks stand up and say that they are taking their monies out of white owned banks and will only be using black owned banks and all of black America should do the same? And with that money we will start building our own factories making cars, bikes, machines, etc, start building our own schools across the country and we will be in charge of teaching our children not the government. Also we will stop doing business with all companies that disrespect us?? What do you think would happen to America if they had the guts to say that? They have the power to make a dramatic change for ALL of us including them, but for some reason they don`t. WHY? , Yet there are many that defend them. That I also do not understand. Some may ask why don`t I or folks like me do it. Simple answer is we would not have the effect like they would and I think everyone knows that. If they opened their mouths and take a stand it would be like an atom bomb dropped in this country.
@Big Woman much people don’t seem to understand that…..Black people when they make it leave their own behind.
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