Poor levels of college enrollment, disengagement, underachievement and low graduation rates rank among the most pressing problems facing black males in the United States. But a study released yesterday by University of Pennsylvania’s new Center for the Study of Race and Equity in Education emphasized instead the levels of achievement among black male undergraduates, which at times go unnoticed by education experts.
The report was titled “Black Male Student Success in Higher Education” and authored by Dr. Shaun Harper, and it focused on black male trends in applying to college, choosing and paying for colleges, transitioning to college and responding productively to racism.
The study highlights “persons, policies, programs and resources that help black men succeed across a range of college and university contexts,” Harper stated in the report.
The University has been the leading public school in black graduation rates for 20 years with an 85 percent graduation rate. Since 2005, the proportion of black students at the University with a GPA of 3.0 or higher has risen to 47 percent, an increase of 16 percent.
Dean of African-American Affairs Maurice Apprey said the University attributes its high African-American graduation rate in part to advising and mentoring, which Harper highlights in his report.
“Those who are interested in black male student success have much to learn from black men who have actually been successful,” Harper said in the report. “To increase their educational attainment, the popular one-sided emphasis on failure and low-performing black male undergraduate must be counterbalanced with insights gathered from those who somehow manage to navigate their way to and through higher education, despite all that is stacked against them.”
The study suggested black students who are encouraged during high school are more successful in college.
“The participants’ early schooling experiences almost always included at least one influential teacher who helped solidify their interest in going to college,” the report stated.
Third-year College student Lolan Sagoe-Moses, a member of the Collegiate 100 Society, an organization devoted to mentoring young African-Americans in Charlottesville high schools, said mentorship in high school greatly impacted his intellectual development.
Black students are presented with negative black stereotypes, which can be intimidating, Sagoe-Moses said.
Deborah McDowell, director of the University’s African-American and African studies program, said African-American students do well for the same reasons as other students.
“What accounts for the high success rates is that this is a selective University and so students come to us mainly prepared to do college-level work,” McDowell said. “We provide our students an excellent education once they are here.”
Apprey said there is still room for improvement despite the University’s high black graduation rates.
“You can graduate with a 2.2 [GPA],” Apprey said. “Now we have to do strategic alignment between high graduation rates and correspondingly high GPAs.”
The study included interviews with 219 students at 42 historically black U.S. colleges who overcame obstacles to become competitive candidates for jobs, internships, and professional schools.