Pigford Files: What Is the John Boyd Institute?

In testimony before a congressional committee in 2008, John Boyd introduced himself and said “I am Dr. John Boyd. I am President and founder of the National Black Farmers Association, which has more than 94,000 members in 46 states.”

In addition to my strong back in agriculture, I also founded the John Boyd Agricultural and Technology Institute to help educate farmers of all educational levels in order to fight illiteracy. To teach familiarity with and use of the internet, and much more. The program has assisted several thousand farmers and has been expanded to Denmark Technical College.

Boyd’s National Black Farmers Association website has a page about the John Boyd Argicultural and Technology Institute as well — complete with a photo showing a road sign.

In a ’10 Questions’ article in 2009, John Boyd began one of his answers by prefacing, “Being a visiting professor and forming the John Boyd Agriculture and Technology Institute”.

As I was driving through Virginia yesterday, I decided to take a drive by the Boyd Institute and hoped to walk the hallowed halls that have taught thousands of farmers. Boyd has talked about the Boyd Institute so much that I was keen to visit this august institute.

But there’s no there there. Literally.

I went to the campus of St. Paul’s College, a small Christian college in southern Virginia. There’s no Boyd Institute. The secuirty guard I spoke with had never heard of it but suggested I talk to someone in the administration building. I found a woman who knew about it — she told me that Boyd had never taught classes there and that the ‘Institute’ was an office that Boyd kept for a few years that he would sometimes use to make phone calls. She said she’d never seen thousands of farmers training there. Or any.

But what about the expanded John Boyd Institute program at Denmark Technical College in South Carolina that Boyd told congress about in 2008? I phoned Denmark Tech and was told to visit Boyd’s website. I asked if there was a John Boyd Institute on campus and was told that they just referred people to the website. I was told Boyd had never taught classes there.

I have no reason to believe that St. Paul’s or Denmark aren’t solid, small schools that do a good job for their students and I don’t want the pretend John Boyd Institutes at those schools to cast any aspersions on them. Why did these two colleges ‘host’ the John Boyd Institute? There seems to be a link — a man named John Waddell.

Waddell was the president of St. Paul’s in 2001, when Boyd claims to have founded the Institute there. Waddell was president of Denmark at the time Boyd claimed to Congress that he had just expanded there. And although I currently have no clear link to Boyd related to the following charges, John Waddell was fired from his position at Denmark after an audit revealed irregularities, inclduing…

…a student recruitment program unlawfully paid for with about $52,000 in federal funds; financial aid given to ineligible students who did not have high school diplomas or GEDs; about $31,000 in fees incurred due to late filing of payroll taxes; and lack of compliance with state codes in the hiring of an Atlanta accounting firm.

I have calls out to both Mr. Boyd and Mr. Waddell for comment about their relationship and for clarification about the real facts about the John Boyd Institute.