Exploring Institutional Characteristics of Historically Black Colleges and Universities That Successfully Graduate Black Students Who Earn STEM Doctoral Degrees

• In Event: Moscone Center North Roundtable Session 12
  In Roundtable Session: Sustaining the Historically Black College/University: Philanthropy, Faculty Development, and Policy

Abstract

This research examines characteristics of HBCUs that enable STEM undergraduate students to thrive and prepare them to subsequently pursue and obtain doctoral degrees. The objectives of this study are to identify: 1) unique characteristics of STEM learning environments at the 21 HBCUs that NSF ranked as top producers of Black baccalaureate degree recipients who received science and engineering (S&E) doctorates (we refer as anchor institutions); 2) HBCUs that have similar characteristics as anchor HBCUs (we refer as emerging institutions). This archival quantitative, data mining study, used data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) of the National Center for Education Statistics. Information from this study will reveal important distinctions between HBCUs with evidence of success and those with potential.

Authors

• Ivory A. Toldson, Howard University

• Mercy Mugo, QEM Network

• Cynthia Overton, Kapor Center

• Mahlet Megra, American Institutes for Research