Long article, but a really good read. If you don't read the article, at least scroll down to the chart at the bottom. You will be surprised at the "profile" of black males that are successful in college in the modern era.
He was a 25-year-old black male driving through an Atlantic City public-housing project in an expensive red Chevrolet Suburban with gleaming chrome hubcaps and out-of-state tags. Thinking he looked suspicious, police officers pulled him over and found crack cocaine, marijuana, and two handguns in the SUV. One officer pointed a gun at his head, he recalls, while the other handcuffed him and said, "You know that your life is over, huh?"
Mr. Fortson believed him. "To be a black male convicted felon, I thought my life was over," he says.
The Gender Issue Highlights
DATA: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender of Students at 4,438 Colleges
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Today, though, Mr. Fortson is an honor student in his senior year at Rutgers University at New Brunswick. While serving part of a six-year sentence for drugs and weapons offenses, he met a Rutgers historian who tutors inmates and runs a re-entry program that helps felons go from prison to college. That associate professor, Donald Roden, helped him through the admissions process after he was released early from prison.
Mr. Fortson is a rarity in higher education, for reasons that have to do with race, economics, expectations, and criminal-justice practices. As one of many young black men with a criminal history, he has been given a second chance. He is an exception to a rule which seems to dictate that punishment for a crime does not end when a felon leaves prison. A criminal conviction often creates barriers to voting, employment, and housing, and forecloses opportunities to attend college.
By enrolling in a four-year college, Mr. Fortson is also defying higher education's gender gap, which touches all races and ethnic groups but is widest among black students. Black women earn almost twice as many degrees—at every level—as black men.
According to a recent report, "Challenging the Status Quo," by the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation and a group of scholars, more black men attend college than is commonly believed. Black men made up 5.5 percent of all college students ages 18 and older in 2010, a number proportional to the population of adult black males in the United States, the report notes. More than 40 percent of black male students attended community colleges, and 11 percent were enrolled at for-profit institutions. More were enrolled at the University of Phoenix than at any other institution, according to the report.
But while black men are going to college, they're not graduating in high numbers. Only 16 percent went on to complete degrees, compared with 20 percent of black women and 32 percent of white men, according to the report. In 2010, men earned 34 percent of the bachelor's degrees and 35 percent of the doctoral degrees awarded to blacks, according to data from the U.S. Education Department. Among whites, men earned 44 percent of bachelor's degrees and just under half of doctoral degrees.
Recent discussions of the black gender gap in higher education invariably point to the incarceration of black men as a major contributing factor. Experts say they cannot provide data on how much the so-called school-to-prison pipeline affects black male enrollment, but they say it cannot be overlooked. They also say it is erroneous to assume that these young men were headed to college in the first place.
http://chronicle.com/article/From-Cellblock-to-Campus-One/135294/
He was a 25-year-old black male driving through an Atlantic City public-housing project in an expensive red Chevrolet Suburban with gleaming chrome hubcaps and out-of-state tags. Thinking he looked suspicious, police officers pulled him over and found crack cocaine, marijuana, and two handguns in the SUV. One officer pointed a gun at his head, he recalls, while the other handcuffed him and said, "You know that your life is over, huh?"
Mr. Fortson believed him. "To be a black male convicted felon, I thought my life was over," he says.
The Gender Issue Highlights
DATA: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender of Students at 4,438 Colleges
BUY A COPY: Digital and Print Editions at the Chronicle Store
BROWSE THE FULL ISSUE: News, Commentary, and Data
Today, though, Mr. Fortson is an honor student in his senior year at Rutgers University at New Brunswick. While serving part of a six-year sentence for drugs and weapons offenses, he met a Rutgers historian who tutors inmates and runs a re-entry program that helps felons go from prison to college. That associate professor, Donald Roden, helped him through the admissions process after he was released early from prison.
Mr. Fortson is a rarity in higher education, for reasons that have to do with race, economics, expectations, and criminal-justice practices. As one of many young black men with a criminal history, he has been given a second chance. He is an exception to a rule which seems to dictate that punishment for a crime does not end when a felon leaves prison. A criminal conviction often creates barriers to voting, employment, and housing, and forecloses opportunities to attend college.
By enrolling in a four-year college, Mr. Fortson is also defying higher education's gender gap, which touches all races and ethnic groups but is widest among black students. Black women earn almost twice as many degrees—at every level—as black men.
According to a recent report, "Challenging the Status Quo," by the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation and a group of scholars, more black men attend college than is commonly believed. Black men made up 5.5 percent of all college students ages 18 and older in 2010, a number proportional to the population of adult black males in the United States, the report notes. More than 40 percent of black male students attended community colleges, and 11 percent were enrolled at for-profit institutions. More were enrolled at the University of Phoenix than at any other institution, according to the report.
But while black men are going to college, they're not graduating in high numbers. Only 16 percent went on to complete degrees, compared with 20 percent of black women and 32 percent of white men, according to the report. In 2010, men earned 34 percent of the bachelor's degrees and 35 percent of the doctoral degrees awarded to blacks, according to data from the U.S. Education Department. Among whites, men earned 44 percent of bachelor's degrees and just under half of doctoral degrees.
Recent discussions of the black gender gap in higher education invariably point to the incarceration of black men as a major contributing factor. Experts say they cannot provide data on how much the so-called school-to-prison pipeline affects black male enrollment, but they say it cannot be overlooked. They also say it is erroneous to assume that these young men were headed to college in the first place.
http://chronicle.com/article/From-Cellblock-to-Campus-One/135294/
