The American Council on Education recently released a new report on the status of underrepresented groups in American higher education. While most of the data is from U.S. Department of Education and U.S. Census Bureau reports, it is useful to have all this information on the status of African Americans in higher education in one place.
The report has chapters on college student enrollments, persistence, graduation as well as a wealth of information on graduate students, student debt, faculty in higher education, and employment and earnings of college graduates.
Here are some of the important facts in the report relating to African Americans.
- Black students enrolled in bachelor’s degree programs exhibited lower rates of first-year persistence and higher rates of dropping out than any other racial or ethnic group.
- The gender gap in enrollment for Black students remained the widest of any group.
- Black students graduated with the greatest student loan debt of any group.
- Even with a bachelor’s degree in hand, African Americans ages 25 to 34 earned 15 percent less and had an unemployment rate two-thirds higher than the typical bachelor’s degree holder of similar age
- Half of all Black doctoral students in 2016 were enrolled in for-profit institutions. The vast majority of Black doctoral recipients who attended these schools borrowed an average amount of $128,359 for graduate study.
The full 336-page report, Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education: A Status Report, may be downloaded by clicking here.
