The Top 100 Interpreting the Data
By Victor M.H. Borden and Pamela C. Brown
Substantial growth continues in both the number and percentage of students of color obtaining master’s, doctoral and first professional degrees, but there is still notable under-representation among African-Americans, Hispanics and American Indians at the doctoral and first professional ranks. The overall numbers also mask important representational differences across disciplines among various racial/ethnic groups. Asian Americans continue to obtain disproportionally high numbers of advanced degrees in the STEM fields (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) and the health professions. African-Americans, in turn, have very low representation in these areas but very high representation in education and human service fields like public administration and criminal justice. Hispanics — the fastest-growing ethnic group in the overall population — have made notable strides in representation among master’s and doctoral degree recipients but not as much among first professional degree recipients, which are dominated by law and the clinical health professions. Over a 10-year period, minority gains have outpaced White increases, but as advanced degree attainment becomes more closely linked to positions of influence, the stakes become greater.
This edition of the Top 100 analysis considers graduate degrees awarded during the 2004-2005 academic year based on data from the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Integrated Postsecondary Education Data Set (IPEDS). As in past years, this analysis is based on “preliminary” data but is complete and accurate for those colleges and universities included in the analysis. We only consider in this analysis institutions eligible for Title IV funding (i.e., accredited by a federally recognized agency), located in the 50 states and the District of Columbia and that award post-baccalaureate degrees.
The IPEDS data collection is now a Web-based survey that institutions use to submit their degree counts to NCES. Colleges and universities are required to categorize their degree programs according to the national Classification of Instructional Program (CIP) code system. Based on the data reported through CIP, we are able to compare institutions using a common set of established categories. While the mapping system used may not be perfect, the comparisons across institutions are fairly reliable.
We base this analysis on racial/ethnic status, self-reported by students during their college career. This information is reported through a set of standard federal categories: non-resident alien (foreign); Black, non-Hispanic; American or Alaskan Native (American Indian); Asian or Pacific Islander (Asian American); Hispanic; White, non-Hispanic; and race/ethnicity unknown. These minority categories include only U.S. citizens or permanent residents. Students choose from among these categories based on the convention used by their institution. The institution then determines how to “map” these categories to the standard federal categories, as only one racial/ethnic identification can be chosen per student. While the federal government uses a “multi-identification” practice for the population census, these practices have yet to be extended to IPEDS and other federal reporting systems.
Presented are the Top 100 lists for each postgraduate degree level (master’s, first professional and doctoral) and each racial/ethnic group. The same structure used in the bachelor’s analysis is used for the graduate analysis. The lists display the total number of degrees granted last year to the targeted group, followed by the number conferred to men, women and overall for the most recent year available (2004-2005). Two percentage columns are provided, with the first indicating the representation of that specific racial/ethnic group relative to all students at that institution who received that type of degree. The second column indicates the percentage change in degree conferrals for that group from the prior year.
