© 2026 Blue Ridge Public Radio
Blue Ridge Mountains banner background
Your source for information and inspiration in Western North Carolina.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
BPR's Summer Car Raffle is open! Learn more

Bennett’s Back-And-Forth Drama

Keeping up the fight, Bennett College isn't giving up yet.
Keeping up the fight, Bennett College isn't giving up yet.

The Bennett College accreditation fight goes on. The historically black liberal arts college for women lost its accreditation on Friday, Feb. 22, then almost immediately had it temporarily reinstated by a court order. 

Host Frank Stasio talks with WUNC’s Greensboro reporter Naomi Prioleau about Bennett College losing its accreditation and what's next for the school.

The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools’ Commission on Colleges argued that despite students and administrators’ success in raising $9.5 million for the school, they had “failed to show that the institution possesses resources demonstrating a stable financial base.”

Bennett is now suing the commision and appealing to another accreditation group. Host Frank Stasio talks with WUNC’s Greensboro reporter Naomi Prioleau about the swiftly unfolding saga and Bennett’s prospects. 

Copyright 2019 North Carolina Public Radio

Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.
Jennifer Brookland is a temporary producer for The State of Things.