The Association of American Medical Colleges reports that 49,480 individuals applied to the 2014 entering classes at U.S. medical schools. This was a 3.1 percent increase from 2013. There were 3,990 African Americans applicants to U.S. medical schools, an increase of 3.2 percent from a year ago. African Americans made up 8.1 percent of all medical school applicants in 2014.
In 2014, there were 1,412 African Americans who matriculated at U.S. medical schools. They made up 6.9 percent of the 20,343 new entrants to medical schools. In 2007, African Americans made up 7.3 percent of all new entrants to U.S. medical schools.
If “America” and definitely Black America truly wanted produce more native born Black doctors, it would expend comparable time, money, and material resources to ensure this was the intended outcome. For example, the majority of these so-called Division I football and basketball programs will comb all across this country from the smallest hamlet, town, rural farming area, to the large metropolitan area to find the next “Blue Chip” athlete(or should I say that next big meal ticket for the university).
Yet, these same so-called institutions will not expend similar enthusiasm recruiting Black students who didn’t score in the 90 percentile on the SES test called the ACT or SAT. For those who dissent, there’s no definitive proof in a students ACT or SAT score and their ability to be successful while in undergraduate school. For the empirical purists out there, data can not measure one’s non-cognitive skills such as perseverance and internal drive.
In other words, until the Black community (regardless of your title, employment, place of residence, or group affiliation, etc. ) take upon themselves to create, devise, and cultivate a robust academic feeder system that will result in the production of more Black doctors, we can not blame HWCUs but ourselves. As El Haj Malik Shabazz (Malcolm X) stated, “don’t expect the man to do for you for what you’re not doing for yourself”.