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Black, White, and _Brown_ II: "With No Deliberate Speed"

I did some fact checking on Hunter College's graduation rates overall and by race and gender. The problem of low graduation rates is across the board at Hunter, at my institution (Southern Illinois) and nationwide. Women, who now make up a majority of college students, also have higher graduation rates. Hunter seems to be much more female-dominated than most schools, however, with 70 percent of students women.

Here are the numbers for Hunter College (available from www.collegeresults.org and based on government's IPEDs six-year graduation rates; every school in the country is required to report this data -- look up your own school to see for yourself). Graduation rates are over six-years:

Overall: 39%

White Female: 48%
White Male: 27%

Black Female: 37%
Black Male: 28% (actually higher than the white male figure).

Women have much higher graduation rates across other ethnicities as well. These numbers are very close to my institution's (SIU).

Clearly, there is a "male" crisis that is not limited by race. What is at the bottom of this? Christina Hoff Sommers has a book on the topic but it's on my "to read when I finally get time" list.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Bean