When I graduated college, it was a big accomplishment both for myself and those close to me. While much of the day is all a blur, there are certain moments that are very clear. I recall a moment when I was sitting in the audience and as each student walked the stage to receive their diploma, I could count how many of them were black men.
I noticed that there were, including me, eight black male graduates. All of us had our family present who all was just as proud as we were but I couldn’t help but be perplexed about how low the number of black male graduates there were. Especially when I remember my incoming freshman class had an overwhelming number of young black men enroll. I thought to myself will this ever change?
This thought did not just occur on graduation day; rather it had been a rolling thought almost my entire undergraduate career. But by my junior year, I couldn’t keep asking. I remember one evening I was in a dorm common room helping out a friend, another young black male, with an assignment when eight other black male students came to sit down as well. What struck me about this sit down was I had seen almost every one of these guys on campus at least once but this was the first time I ever spoke to them and vice versa. We talked about our majors, our hometowns, and how we all ended up in college.
They all had told me that they were athletes and they were all recruited by their coaches on the basis that they would be the star player. To their surprise that is not what eventually happened. They also told me that many of other black men like them were recruited for the same reason because of too much emphasis placed on athletic duties and little to no emphasis on academic duties, by the end of fall semester, most of them transferred.
At first, I just thought maybe I was overthinking it. Maybe there were a group of young black male students that weren’t athletes and I just hadn’t seen them yet. Maybe more black men graduated and I just wasn’t aware? That is until I did my own research and came across some shocking revelations.
According to Black Male Student Success in Higher Education, a 2012 report done by the National Black Male College Achievement Study at the University of Philadelphia, data that was collected shows that black males seem to fall behind in the pursuit of higher education. Black men are overrepresented in collegiate sports- being 3.6% of the undergraduate class but 55.3% of athletes. (Harper 2012) Black male college completion rates are the lowest among both sexes and all racial/ethnic groups in U.S college system. (Harper 2006a; Strayhorn, 2010) Lastly, in 2002, it was reported that black men were only 4.3% of students enrolled in college, the same number in 1976. (Harper 2006a; Strayhorn, 2010) Beyond the numbers, the assumption is Black males are considered ill-equipped for academia and as a result, many of them disappear before reaching graduation.
These numbers not only confirmed what I had been seeing happen but it also helped expose a truth that lied beneath Black men in America. Many of us have fathers and grandfathers who are not college educated and were limited in some form or fashion. Many of us have had experiences where we are the only Black male in a class and we are seen as an anomaly to want to pursue intellect. We are the beneficiaries of a culture where boys are told incessantly the only way to be successful is to be like Lebron James and Michael Jordan. What was once a revolution has now transformed into the unintended legacy of Black men.
Finding themselves in, what sociologist Arlie Hochschild’s refers to in her work on gender, a “stalled revolution,” today there is a myriad of Black men being afforded the opportunity to attend college than ever before. However, the numbers of those who graduate continue to stagnate. My experience and those like me who have managed to graduate represent a thread in the narrative of the Black male intellect.
