The New York Times recently published its list of the Top Colleges Doing the Most for the American Dream. The rankings are based on the percentage of undergraduate students who receive federal Pell Grants as well as the net price students must pay to attend these institutions.
A new report from the Center of Education and Workforce at Georgetown University finds that nearly 90,000 students who are eligible for federal Pell Grants for low income families, are qualified to be admitted to the nation’s selective colleges and universities but do not enroll in these institutions.
The Alumni Association of the University of Michigan recently announced a $30 million expansion of its Leadership, Excellence, Achievement and Diversity (LEAD) scholarship program. To be eligible for a LEAD scholarship, a student must have African-American, Latino or Native American heritage.
The Formation Scholar awards at Berklee College of Music, Howard University, Parsons School of Design, and Spelman College were established “to encourage and support young women who are unafraid to think outside the box and are bold, creative, conscious, and confident.”
Charlayne Hunter-Gault and her husband Ron Gault have created the Giving Voice to the Voiceless endowment at the University of Georgia. The endowment will provide grants to university students to promote social justice and global understanding.
The Broadening Ohio’s Workforce in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics-Agriculture scholarship offers a renewable $10,000 scholarship for first-year students and community college transfers. To be eligible, students must be Ohio residents and have had a minimum 3.0 grade point average in high school or community college.
Julian Bond, the noted civil rights leader, legislator, author, NAACP chair, and long-time faculty member at the University of Virginia who died in 2015, was the co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Lowe’s Corporation has made a $500,000 contribution to the United Negro College Fund’s Emergency Student Aid program. The program offers financial aid to seniors at HBCUs who need funds in order to stay in school and complete their degree program.
The new scholarship at the medical school was made possible by a gift from Annie Marie Garraway, the sister of Dr. Levi Watkins Jr., the first Black graduate of the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.
Under the so-called Excelsior Scholarship plan, tuition at all two- and four-year college of the State University of New York System and the City University of New York System would be paid by the state for all full-time students from families whose income are below $125,000.
Robert F. Smith, founder and CEO of Vista Equity Partners and the only African American man on the Forbes list of the 400 wealthiest Americans, has been identified by the Nigerian government as the Good Samaritan who is sponsoring the higher education of 24 women who had been kidnapped by Boko Haram.
In the fall of 2015, the National Merit Scholarship Program announced that it was ending its National Achievement Scholarship Program. Over the past 51 years, the program had awarded about $108 million to more than 34,000 college-bound African Americans. The replacement program will award funds to college graduates to pay off loans or for graduate study.
The American Talent Initiative, funded by the Bloomberg Philanthropies, hopes to expand to 270 educational institutions nationwide. It has set a goal of enrolling and graduating 50,000 students from low-income families by 2025.
Earlier this month at halftime of the Big 10 Championship Game, Jarrius Adams won the Dr. Pepper Tuition Giveaway Football Throw-Off competition. Adams threw 11 footballs, 15 yards into a target during the 30-second contest beating his rival and winning the $100,000 scholarship prize.
The data shows that 80 percent of all students at HBCUs borrow money under federal student loan programs. One quarter of all HBCUs graduates had student loan debt of more than $40,000. This is four times the rate of non-HBCU graduates.
The Jackson Institute currently enrolls about 25 students in its master’s degree program in global affairs. About half of these students are from outside the United States. Two new fellowships will be available for African students or others who have shown an interest in studying Africa.
The Philip Freelon Fellowship Fund at the Harvard Graduate School of Design will be used to provide financial aid to African Americans and students from other underrepresented groups who are pursuing graduate degrees in design.
The FAMU Foundation Board of Directors approved the $5 million initiative to help the university increase its graduation rate, enhance academic programs, and recruit top talent.
Four years after they graduate from college, Black students have an average debt load that is $25,000 more than White students who had graduated from college four years earlier. And the amount of debt held by African American college graduates, when adjusted for inflation, has increased sixfold in the past 15 years.
The U.S. Department of Education recently released a new report on participation in the Pell Grant program. The need-based program provides up to $5,815 annually in federal funds for college students.
New data released by the university shows that there has been a significant drop in students of color from underrepresented groups. In 2015, students of color made up 28 percent of the entering class compared to 24 percent this year.
The four students from African nations have been awarded full scholarships at Penn State. The scholars will also receive mentoring and internship opportunities. The first cohort includes two students from Ghana and one each from Rwanda and Zimbabwe.
A new 188-page report from the U.S. Department of Education offers a wide-ranging summary of most of the important educational statistics on enrollment, financial aid, graduation rates, degree attainments etc. as they pertain to race all in one place.
Jackson State University in Mississippi has created an endowed scholarship fund in honor of Charles Holmes, the former professor and chair of the department of political science in the College of Liberal Arts.
Research conducted at Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis found that low-to-moderate income Black students and graduates accrue on average $7,721 more student debt than their White counterparts.
The Charles and Mildred Nilon Scholarship will be offered to students who “are committed to advancing educational opportunities in under-resourced schools, especially those that serve African American communities.”
Under the program, students who graduate from one of the City Colleges of Chicago who are admitted to Northwestern to complete their bachelor’s degree, will be eligible for up to $50,000 per year in scholarship money.
Howard University, the historically Black research university in Washington, D.C., has issued a 50 percent rebate on the last semester’s tuition for students who completed their degrees in the traditional four-year time frame.
The author and television and radio broadcaster has established a new scholarship at the School of Public and Environmental Affairs that will be earmarked for African Americans with preference given to those who are the first in their family to attend college.
The Graduate Initiative for Diversity, Inclusion and Access aims to increase the diversity of the student body in the graduate school at the university and to broaden academic support for underrepresented minority students.
According to a new study, on average, an African American college graduate has 68 percent more debt than a White college graduate. But the racial gap in student loan debt is highest among affluent Black and White families.
The goal of the initiative is to increase the number of Black students and faculty on campus and to make the campus environment more welcoming to African Americans. The latest Education Department data shows that Blacks make up just one percent of the undergraduate student body.
Rev. Pickney, who was a member of the state Senate in South Carolina, was murdered at the Mother A.M.E. Church in Charleston, South Carolina, along with eight other parishioners. A new $3.2 million fund honoring Rev. Pickney will provide scholarships for African American college students.
The Fund II Foundation of Austin, Texas, led by Robert F. Smith, founder and CEO of Vista Equity Partners, has teamed up with the United Negro College Fund to establish a $48 million scholarship program for African Americans in STEM fields.
The University of Cincinnati has announced that it has created the Provost Graduate Fellowship that will provide financial aid for students from underrepresented minority groups in the university’s graduate programs.
An analysis of the student debt load for fourth-year undergraduate students found that in 1990, 69 percent of African American college students had accumulated debt. By 2012, the figure was 90 percent.
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