Xavier among nation's leading producers of students with chemistry degrees - noteworthy news - Xavier University - Brief Article

Black Issues in Higher Education, April 24, 2003

NEW ORLEANS

Long considered a national leader in the production of undergraduates who go on to receive degrees in medicine, Xavier University now holds the added distinction of being a leading producer of undergraduates earning degrees in chemistry.

The school was recently listed in Chemical & Engineering News magazine as the 20th leading producer of undergraduates earning bachelor's in chemistry. Xavier was the only historically Black institution listed among the nation's top 25. The leading producer, according to the article, is the University of California-San Diego. There are 1,041 postsecondary institutions that award the bachelor's in chemistry.

African Americans, like American Indians and Latinos, are still woefully underrepresented in the field, according to "Anatomy of a Chemistry Class," the C&E News article which featured the listing.

The data shows HBCUs continue to lead in the production of Black undergraduates in chemistry, with Xavier producing 49, more than double the next closest institutions, Howard University and Morehouse College, which produced 19 each.

The article reflects graduation data from the 1999-2000 academic year collected by the National Center for Education Statistics and the National Science Foundation.