US: Minority Students Increasingly Cluster at Minority-Serving Institutions

[Harold F. Schiffman]

 http://chronicle.com/daily/2007/11/814n.htm
Wednesday, November 28, 2007


Minority Students Increasingly Cluster at Minority-Serving Institutions,
Federal Report Shows

By JEAN EVANGELAUF

Undergraduates who are members of minority groups are increasingly
concentrated at colleges that are classified as "minority-serving,"
according to a U.S. Education Department report released on Tuesday. The
report, "Characteristics of Minority-Serving Institutions and Minority
Undergraduates Enrolled in These Institutions," shows that the number of
two- and four-year colleges whose undergraduate enrollment is at least 25
percent minority jumped from 414 in 1984 to 1,254 in 2004. In 1984
minority-serving colleges enrolled 38 percent of all minority
undergraduates; by 2004 they enrolled 58 percent of them.

Over all, minority-serving colleges accounted for 32 percent of all
colleges in 2004, up from 14 percent in 1984. That increase mirrored the
growth in minority undergraduate enrollment, which climbed 146 percent, to
4.7 million. over the 20-year period. (See table.)

The Education Department defines seven mutually exclusive categories of
minority-serving institutions. Two are designated by federal law:
historically black colleges and universities, or HBCU's, and tribal
colleges. The other categories are based on undergraduate enrollment.
American Indian-serving, Asian-serving, black-serving, and
Hispanic-serving institutions are those at which the specified minority
group accounts for at least 25 percent of enrollment, while each of the
other minority groups makes up less than 25 percent of enrollment. A group
of "other minority-serving" colleges includes institutions in which
minority students make up at least half of enrollment but do not fit any
other category.

The largest numerical growth was in the category of black-serving
colleges, whose number rose from 200 in 1984 to 622 two decades later.
Over the same period, the number of Hispanic-serving colleges also climbed
rapidly, from 58 to 366, the report says.

Much of that growth came among for-profit colleges. In 2004, 36 percent of
minority-serving colleges were in the for-profit sector, compared with 15
percent of non-minority-serving colleges. Black-serving colleges had the
largest representation of for-profit colleges, with 43 percent, followed
by Hispanic-serving colleges, of which 41 percent were for-profit.


Diversity at Hispanic-Serving Colleges

In 2004, Hispanic-serving colleges enrolled the largest share of all
minority undergraduates, with 26.8 percent; followed by black-serving
colleges (15.6 percent); Asian-serving colleges (7.5 percent);
historically black colleges (5.1 percent); other minority-serving colleges
(2.6 percent); and tribal and American Indian-serving colleges (0.6
percent).

In addition to enrolling half of all Hispanic undergraduates in 2004,
Hispanic-serving colleges also educated substantial numbers of other
minority groups. Nineteen percent of all Asian undergraduates at American
colleges that year were enrolled at Hispanic-serving institutions, along
with 13 percent of American Indian undergraduates, and 11 percent of black
undergraduates.

Minority-serving institutions are more likely than other institutions to
enroll low-income students and to have an above-average proportion of
female students, according to the report.

Except for Asian-serving colleges, minority-serving four-year institutions
tended to be less selective than other institutions. While 76 percent of
American Indian-serving colleges, 30 percent of Hispanic-serving colleges,
29 percent of HBCU's, and 23 percent of other black-serving colleges had
open-admissions policies, only 9 percent of non-minority-serving colleges
did, the report said.

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