Students Of Color Earning More Graduate Degrees

Hispanic Times Magazine, Dec, 1998

All Americans Must Have Access To Higher Learning If We Are To Be Globally Competitive

More students of color are enrolling in colleges and universities and earning degrees than in previous years, according to a report released today by the American Council on Education (ACE). Gains in enrollment and degree attainment indicate that efforts by higher education institutes to expand educational opportunities for students of color have netted positive results. However, future progress is threatened by an expected decline in the overall enrollment of minorities resulting from legal restrictions on the use of affirmative action in college admissions policies in some states, and by the recent slowing down of post-secondary gains by students of color.

The ACE report, The Sixteenth Annual Status Report on Minorities in Higher Education, reveals that students of color have experienced steady increases in college enrollment since the mid-80s, but that the rate of growth has slowed in recent years. According to the report, the enrollment rate for these students rose by 3.2 percent for 1995 to 1996 (the latest year for which data is available), slightly higher than the 2.9 percent increase between 1994 to 1995, but lower than the 1993-94 gain of 4.6 percent and the 1991-92 increase of 7.1 percent.

Report data show that students of color also earned more post-secondary degrees in 1995 (the latest year for which degree data is available). These students posted an 8.5 percent increase in the number of associate degrees earned; 6.6 percent in the number of bachelor's degrees earned; 9.3 percent in master's degrees; and 6.8 percent in first-professional degrees. The gains, however, were smaller than those experienced in 1994 when degree attainment ranged from 11 percent at the master's level to 8.5 percent in the bachelor's degree category.

"The gains that students of color have made in higher education is good news for the future health of our nations," said ACE President Stanley O. Ikenberry. "If the country is to remain globally competitive and its citizens are to enjoy a high quality of life, all Americans must have access to and be successful in post-secondary studies. The report also reminds us that much work remains to be done to ensure that students of color continued to have access to and be successful in post-secondary studies. The report also reminds us that much work remains to be done to ensure that students of color continued to have access to and be successful in college."

Last year, California's voter-approved measure, Proposition 209, went into effect and banned the use of affirmative action policies by all state agencies. A year earlier, the 1996 Hopwood legal decision prohibited all post-secondary institutions in Texas from considering race in college admissions decisions. The affirmative action bans in both states have had a negative impact on minority post-secondary enrollment.

The ACE report presents data on high school completion, college participation, and educational attainment rates of whites, African Americans, and Hispanics. Similar data on Asian Americans and American Indians is not available because the survey sample on these individuals is too small to provide reliable statistics. However, the report contains information on enrollment, degree attainment, and employment rates for the four major ethnic minority groups. The analysis is based on data from the U.S. Department of Education, the U.S. Bureau of the Census, and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

The report was written by Deborah J. Wilds, deputy director of ACE's Office of Minorities in Higher Education and Reginald Wilson, ACE senior scholar emeritus. William E. Sedlacek, professor of education, director of testing, and assistant director of the counseling center at the University of Maryland College Park, prepared the special focus section of the report that discusses the use of cognitive and noncognitive variables in college admissions processes. The report was published with a grant from The Coca-Cola Foundation, which has made significant contributions to programs and scholarships for students of color and will have contributed a total of $100 million to education during the 1990s.

Among the findings of the report:

HIGH SCHOOL COMPLETION

In 1996, African Americans and Hispanics continued to trail whites in the rate at which they completed high school. The 1996 completion rate was 82.3 percent for whites ages 18 to 24, compared with 75.3 percent for African Americans and 57.5 percent for Hispanics.

The high school completion rate for African Americans has risen nearly 8 percentage points for 1976 to 1996, but gains experienced prior to 1990 accounted for this progress. The rate for Hispanics has fluctuated significantly over the past 20 years and the 1996 rate is only slightly higher than the level recorded in 1976 (55.6 percent).

COLLEGE PARTICIPATION

Following a decade of decreases in the 1980s, the traditional college-age population (ages 18 to 24) in the nation has been relatively steady over the past six years, with only minor declines. These decreases were largely the result of a decline in the white college-age population. However, the higher education participation rate for white students has risen more then 10 percentage points during the past two decades, while the rates for African Americans and Hispanics have fluctuated during this time.