Black and Latino college students are less likely to finish degrees in “S.T.E.M.” fields — science, technology, engineering and math — than their white and Asian counterparts, according to a new study released by the American Council on Education.
The report used U.S. Department of Education statistics, tracking 12,000 undergraduates who enrolled in college in fall 1995.
The results showed that, while black and Latino students began college with the intent to major in technical fields at rates comparable to whites and Asians, problems surfaced later in their academic careers.
By spring 2001, about 87 percent of whites and 95 percent of Asians completed their bachelor’s degrees in the fields, compared to only 63 percent of blacks and Latinos, according to the report. Eugene Anderson, associate director of the Center for Policy Analysis at A.C.E., spearheaded the report with Dongbin Kim, an assistant professor of teaching and leadership at the University of Kansas.
“Our analysis seems to dispel the commonly held belief that African-American and Hispanic students aren’t interested in majoring in S.T.E.M. fields,” Anderson stated in a press release. “We find that these students do pursue these majors and persist beyond the third year, but are not earning enough credits each year to attain a degree within six years.”
Among the key differences between those who completed a degree and those who did not were the common factors associated with successful college careers; a large percentage of degree-earners took “a highly rigorous high school curriculum,” had at least one parent who graduated from college, or came from families with higher incomes, according to the report.
One factor the report strongly emphasized was the impact of working on academic performance. Students who did not complete their degrees were more likely to work 15 hours a week or more, according to Kim.
“Of the students whose major was S.T.E.M., there is a negative correlation between working more than 15 hours weekly and grades [during their] first year,” Kim said. “By contrast, there is a positive correlation between working 14 hours or less and college GPA.”
However, not all work experience negatively impacted academic performance, according to Kim.
“The association between working and degree attainment is not a simple matter of whether students worked or not, but of the number of hours student worked or the kinds of jobs students worked,” Kim said. “There is research which shows that working on campus or working jobs which are related to student majors actually helps students’ involvement in college and thus increases persistence rates.”
The report calls attention to the relationship between college affordability and academic success — a correlation that should draw the attention of higher education groups and lawmakers, Kim said. Appropriately designed working opportunities for targeted populations is directly correlated to increased degree completion rates, since better jobs help students pay for college, according to Kim.
