More Black Males Excelling In Higher Education Despite Discouraging Stats (331 hits)
New research is debunking the idea that young black men are falling behind in higher education. Don’t believe the hype!
The Schott Foundation states that half of the black males in high schools will graduate with their class, and only 20 percent will have a high school diploma or even a GED by the time they turn 25. The Annual Community Survey finds that only about 45 percent of the ones that do make it out of high school will even try to get into college.
Dr. Ivory A. Toldson, on the other hand, presented encouraging new findings from a survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, during the 2014 Education Summit at Morehouse College.
According to the study, 87 percent of black students that were ninth graders in 2009 were in their junior year of high school by 2012. More than that, black students are more apt to move forward in their education than lag behind or drop out. Out of the black students that do leave school, 33 percent of them do so because they were suspended or kicked out.
This is incredible considering information from the Civil Rights Data Collection that shows schools are not challenging black students as much as kids of other races. Not only that but black students are more likely to get the lowest paid teachers with less experience, and schools also level harsher punishments against young black men.
Essentially, even with the odds against them, most black male students are excelling in high school and graduating! That drive to succeed extends beyond high school as these same students work to get into college at a higher rate than their white and Latino contemporaries.
However, while 64 of black males in high school expect to get a college degree, not as many of them are taking preparatory courses in comparison to their white, Asian, and Latino peers. Of course that could always change with the right kind of motivation and encouragement from the people in their lives. It does take a village, people! We always knew our boys were capable, intelligent young men. Now the rest of the world knows it, too!
