Research & Studies

Walden University, headquartered in Minneapolis but conducts most of its business online, awarded 1,536 doctorates to African Americans during the five-year period. This was 12 percent of all doctorates awarded to Black Americans during the five-year period. The only other universities awarding more than 200 doctorates to African Americans were two historically Black educational institutions, Howard University and Jackson State University.

Over the past two decades, 50 percent of Black and 40 percent of Hispanic student loan borrowers have experienced a loan default, compared to 29 percent of their White counterparts.

In the fall of 2024, Black students made up 7.7 percent of all first-year students at law schools in the United States. Among the 2024 cohort of 3,060 entering Black students, 2,099 were women. Thus, women made up nearly 69 percent of all Black first-year law students.

A new study has found that while diversity has grown among America's college-educated adults , diversity in the country's teacher workforce is lagging behind.

The number of Black Americans killed at work in 2022 was the highest number recorded since statistics on workplace fatalities have been collected. But in 2023, Black fatalities at work declined by more than 10 percent.

In 2023, 890 doctoral degrees were awarded in fields where none of the recipients were African Americans.

Scholars from Cornell University have found removing race data from AI applicant-ranking algorithms results in a less diverse applicant pool without meaningfully increasing the group's academic merit.

Despite remaining far below the representation of White professors, Black law faculty are the second most represented racial group in their field. 

African Americans earned 7.7 percent of all doctorates earned by U.S. residents and permanent residents. But Blacks are vastly underrepresented in some disciplines. For example, Blacks earned only 1.9 percent of all doctorates awarded in the geological sciences, 1.2 percent of all mathematics doctorates, 2.5 percent of all doctorates in physics, and 1.9 percent of all doctorates in astronomy.

Among highly selective institutions, Black first-year student enrollment dropped by a staggering 16.9 percent this year, the sharpest drop of any major racial group. This was the first admissions cycle since the Supreme Court ended the use of race-sensitive admissions at colleges and universities.

There were 3,213 scholars from sub-Saharan African nations teaching at U.S. colleges and universities in the 2022-22 academic year. This was up more than 44 percent after nearly a 50 percent increase in the prior year.

Some 2,725 African Americans earned doctorates from U.S. universities in 2023. This is the highest number ever recorded. African Americans earned 4.7 percent of all doctorates awarded by U.S. universities in 2023 and 7.7 percent of all doctorates awarded to U.S. citizens or permanent residents of this country.

According to the latest Open Doors report from the Institute on International Education, there were 9,163 Americans studying in sub-Saharan Africa in the 2022-23 academic year, up 98.6 percent from the previous year. Nearly 39 percent of these students attended universities in the Republic of South Africa.

The race-gender gap in degree attainment among Black Americans is surging. Today, Black women are 14 percentage points more likely to hold an undergraduate degree than their male peers.

According to a new study led by Saint Louis University, Black patients with heart failure are 15 percent less likely to receive palliative care than their White counterparts.

Among sub-Saharan African nations, Nigeria in 2023-24 sent the most students to American colleges and universities. The number of students from Nigeria was more than double the number of students from any other sub-Saharan African nation. Nigerians made up more than one third of all students from sub-Saharan Africa who studied in the United States in the 2023-24 academic year.

According to a new study from CollegeIQ, high school students from all backgrounds are most concerned about campus gun laws and local DEI policies when choosing what college to attend to. However, these concerns are particularly pronounced among Black students.

Despite the official abolition of redlining in 1968, its legacy continues to harm communities of color to this day. A new study has found an association between living in these neighborhoods and delays in HIV treatment.

The report, Miles To Go: The State of Education for Black Students in America, outlines the current challenges and opportunities facing Black students in early childhood, K-12, and secondary education settings in the United States.

In their analysis, the authors found that Black Americans, on average, had less low-cost debt during midlife than Americans from other racial groups, resulting in economic distress that may prevent them from receiving high-quality healthcare later in life.