Inequities in funding for Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCUs) has been a deep-rooted issue in the American education system for decades. While the venture capital industry has vowed for years to invest in more Black and people of color, Silicon Valley venture capital (VC) firm Base10 Partners is following through on that promise with a unique initiative bridging the gap between VC and higher learning. A press release reports that Base10 Partners announced the raise of a $250 million fund for an initiative known as the Advancement Initiative — which aims to invest in tech companies and then take a portion of the profit from the fund and donate it to HBCU endowments and student scholarships. Base10 will reportedly create scholarships in the name of each of its portfolio companies to then fund the education of HBCU STEM students. Since debuting this past March, the fund has already completed eight investments in several tech startups, including Attentive, Nubank, Brex,...