Cornick ’52: Ripon’s first black student council president

In 1951, Delroy L. Cornick ’52 became the first black student to be elected president of the Ripon College Student Senate (referred to as Student Council at the time). It was not without controversy, however, as his opponent dropped out of the race, “refusing to compete against a black” (Ripon Magazine Winter 2000). Later, the two became friends.

Cornick, who came to Ripon from Chicago, majored in mathematics and economics and was a member of Omega Sigma Chi fraternity. He was later dismissed because of this color when the group joined the national Sigma Chi fraternity which, at the time, banned blacks.

He went on to earn a master’s degree from American University and a master’s and doctorate of public administration from the University of Southern California. From 1973 to 1991, he served as professor and chair of the management department and as executive assistant to the president at Morgan State University in Baltimore. He was a business professor and served as a trustee at Howard Community College and was on the board of Howard’s social services department. He co-founded and was associate director of the Center for the Study of Alternative Futures. Cornick died in 2002.