Best Practices

The face of New England’s public schools is changing. At Harding High School in Bridgeport, Conn., 52 percent of the students are Hispanic and 98 percent are minority; the numbers at Hartford Public High School are nearly identical. In Massachusetts, 20 school districts, including those of the state’s five largest cities, have minority student enrollments that exceed 30 percent; smaller districts like Fitchburg, Marlborough and Southbridge serve significant numbers of students who don’t speak English at home. At Lewiston, Maine’s McMahon Elementary School, more than 50 students are from Somali immigrant families; the Lewiston Public Schools’ English Language Learners program is seven times larger today than it was in 2000. Our region’s public schools are experiencing a profound demographic and social transformation that will only accelerate in the next decade.

By contrast, the face of New England’s four-year colleges and universities has changed little. With some notable exceptions, the region’s public and private institutions of higher education admit and graduate a student population that is disproportionately white and middle class. Of the nearly 85,000 bachelor’s degrees awarded by New England institutions in 2000, black students received only 3,319, or 3.9 percent, while Latino students received 2,936, or 3.5 percent.

To produce a class of college graduates that reflects the diversity of our region, educational leaders and public policymakers must confront several major challenges. The first and most urgent challenge is the need to “expand the pipeline” by increasing the number of minority students who are academically well-prepared to succeed at four-year colleges. Second, federal and state governments must ensure that higher education remains affordable for low-income, middle-income and nontraditional students. Third, higher education institutions, bolstered by the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that affirmed their right to consider race in admissions decisions, should move forward to develop admissions and
financial aid policies that include race and ethnicity as part of a multifaceted effort to create more diverse campus communities.

But the admissions process is the first step, not the last, for colleges committed to educating and graduating a diverse population of future leaders. Even those talented minority students who gain admission to competitive colleges face daunting challenges once they arrive on campus. Many have received inadequate high school preparation. Others have distracting family responsibilities or financial hardships. And many students of color feel unwelcome in the privileged confines or small-town surroundings of New England college campuses. In a recent Boston Globe story, a Latina college
student explained that she felt invisible on a New England campus that “looked like Abercrombie and
Fitch America.”

College and university leaders, deeply concerned about the persistent minority achievement gap, are
seeking ways to improve academic outcomes for the minority students they enroll. One promising example is the Consortium on High Achievement and Success (CHAS), a group of highly selective, private liberal arts colleges that was founded in 2000 to promote academic achievement, leadership and greater personal satisfaction among students of color on their campuses. Initially convened by Trinity College in Hartford and funded by the Nellie Mae Education Foundation, CHAS now includes 36 prestigious colleges, mostly in the New England and Middle Atlantic regions. Meeting in Boston
last November, the presidents and provosts of the consortium’s member colleges reaffirmed their commitment to help all students—but particularly minority students—to thrive academically and personally.

These academic leaders recognize that minority student underachievement and disenchantment are
problems their institutions must confront together. To that end, CHAS has launched an effort to measure and compare the academic and personal experiences of minority students across their campuses. This Assessment Project will establish baseline measures and identify effective strategies and interventions that could be replicated on other campuses.

The consortium is also working to improve the teaching and learning environment on its campuses.
CHAS supports opportunities for faculty members, administrators and students to meet, network and establish campus-specific plans to improve the academic and social experience for minority students. CHAS also has launched a Gateway Course Project that seeks to transform entry-level courses that have been identified as major barriers to students, particularly in math and science, into gateways for minority student success. Seven institutions are piloting this project, which trains faculty members in effective mentoring techniques and supports intensive peer-led study groups. Early results show significant improvements in student grades and academic performance.

The consortium is also developing a CHAS Scholars program, modeled on the Meyerhoff Scholars program at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. The program will recruit minority students interested in science- related disciplines to participate in a pre-freshman summer institute and academic year support groups. The CHAS Scholars program will offer motivation, encouragement and a sense of community for students who too often feel isolated on their own campuses.

Just as the small liberal arts colleges in CHAS are confronting the minority achievement gap, so must
New England’s large public universities. These institutions are central to New England’s capacity to educate an increasingly diverse population. But the large size and rural locations of many of the public university campuses— combined with the small minority student populations at most—create a sense of isolation and alienation for many students of color.

One promising program model, also supported by the Nellie Mae Education Foundation, is the Scholars
of the 21st Century Program at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Freshman students of color in the Scholars program enroll in a two-semester course that includes independent research projects and small study groups led by doctoral students in the university’s Afro-American Studies Department. By providing positive role models, rigorous academic expectations and a strong sense of belonging, the Scholars program has significantly increased the sophomore year retention rates and academic success of its students.

Our region’s future sits today in the classrooms of Bridgeport, Fitchburg, Lewiston and many other rapidly changing communities. Those students must not only reach higher education, they must succeed there. That will require institutions of higher education to develop effective strategies to serve the needs of a multicultural student population. Here in New England, our colleges and universities can and must meet that challenge.

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Blenda J. Wilson is president and CEO of the Nellie
Mae Education Foundation. Jay Sherwin manages
the foundation’s Minority High Achievement Initiative.