The Continued Underrepresentation of Black and Latino Undergraduates at the Nation’s 101 Most Selective Public Colleges and Universities

THIS REPORT EXAMINES how access for Black and Latino students at the nation’s 101 most selective public colleges and universities has changed since 2000, and whether these institutions are serving an undergraduate student body that represents the racial and ethnic diversity of their particular state’s population. Access scores, ranging from 0 to 100, measure how well each institution’s Black and Latino enrollment reflects the state’s racial and ethnic demography.

Letter grades further reflect an institution’s access score. Scores of 90 or higher received A’s. Scores in the 80s, 70s, and 60s received B’s, C’s, and D’s, respectively. And scores below 60 received failing grades or F’s.

Very little progress has been made since 2000, and the overwhelming majority of the nation’s most selective public colleges are still inaccessible for Black and Latino undergraduates. Over half of the 101 institutions earned D’s and F’s for access for BOTH Black and Latino students. While underrepresentation at these institutions is problematic for both groups, the findings are much worse for Black students who have less access at these institutions than they did in 2000.

BLACK STUDENT ACCESS

• Over 75% of these colleges received F grades for their representation of Black students. Fewer than 1 out of 10 (9%) received an A, indicating that the percentage of Black students on campus was representative of the state’s Black population.
• Institutions in states with larger Black populations were the least accessible. Nearly all of the 32 institutions in the 14 Southern states, which account for over half of the nation’s Black population, received failing grades. The three institutions without failing grades were in Kentucky and West Virginia, which are the two Southern states with the lowest share of Black residents.
• Since 2000, the percentage of Black students has decreased at nearly 60% of the 101 most selective public colleges and universities.


LATINO STUDENT ACCESS

• Nearly half of these colleges received F grades for their representation of Latino students. Just 1 out of 7 (14%) received an A, indicating that the percentage of Latino students on campus was representative of the state’s Latino population.
• The institutions in the nine states with 75% of the nation’s Latino population were — on average — less accessible. Twenty-seven of 37 institutions (73%) received D’s and F’s.
• While all of the 101 selective public institutions saw gains in the percentage of Latino students since 2000, the gains at 65% of these institutions were less than the growth in the state’s Latino population.