The Spectacular Progress of African Americans in Master’s Degree Awards

The performance of African Americans in winning master’s degrees has been remarkable. In the 2006-07 academic year blacks earned 62,574 master’s degrees at U.S. colleges and universities. This was 10.3 percent of all master’s degrees awarded that year. The number of blacks earning a master’s degree was up 6 percent from the previous year. Since 2000 the number of African Americans earning master’s degrees has increased by more than 74 percent.

Blacks have made solid progress over the past 20 years in increasing the number of master’s degrees earned. In 1990, 15,336 African Americans were awarded master’s degrees from U.S. universities. In the 2006-07 academic year, this figure had more than quadrupled. The percentage of all master’s degrees earned by blacks has increased from 5 percent in 1985 to 10.3 percent today.

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