Rachel Dolezal Didn't Try to Pass as Black at Black College

Rachel Dolezal may be a white woman passing herself off as a black woman, but Jezebel reports that she made no such effort while attending a predominately black college. “She had straight, blonde hair,” a former student at Howard University tells the website. “She didn’t look the way she looks now at all in school," she adds. “She looks about three shades darker.” Dolezal is president of the NAACP in Spokane, and her estranged parents came forward after hearing that their daughter was telling people she was mixed race. Both her parents are white.

People, meanwhile, talks to one of Dolezal's former students in African-American studies at Eastern Washington University who says she's "just confused" by the entire story. "I thought she was mixed," says the woman, who is herself half African-American. "She said her dad was black and her mom was white … that's kind of a big thing to lie about." But she added that she thinks the 37-year-old is a "great person." (The NAACP is standing by Dolezal.)