FOLLOWCALIFORNIA SYSTEMATICALLY UNDERINVESTS IN BLACK DEGREE THE ATTAINMENT MONEY 2021 FEBRUARY Each year, the state of California Systematic underinvestment in Black spends billions of dollars on funding degree attainment did not happen for the University of California (UC), by accident. Underinvestment and California State University (CSU), a lack of support for Black students and California Community Colleges to both pursue and graduate with a (CCC). Those dollars are invested to college degree has been reinforced ensure all California residents have by a fundamentally discriminatory an opportunity to gain the skills and funding model and higher education education they need to participate structure that disadvantages Black in and advance the state’s workforce Californians. It is time for our state and economy. Except, higher leaders to take responsibility for this Black students education investment does not fall racist funding structure and take urgent are systematically equitably across racial/ethnic groups. action to equitize funding so that In fact, when you follow the money, Black students can thrive and have the underinvested in Black students are systematically same opportunities afforded to other by the state when underinvested in by the state when it Californians. comes to higher education funding, it comes to higher perpetuating economic inequity for This brief measures the disparate education funding, Black Californians and the maintenance student funding by race and ethnicity in of a permanent underclass. California with the goal of addressing perpetuating structural inequities that result in a economic system of higher education that spends less on its African-American/Black and inequity for Black Latinx students than their White peers. Californians and the maintenance of a permanent 2 FOLLOW THE MONEYFOLLOW underclass. 2 When viewed as a whole, the state’s system of higher Sixty-nine percent of California's population education appears to be serving students of all races and ethnicities. Figure 1, below, compares California’s is racially diverse, and 71 percent of its undergraduate public higher education population and undergraduate population is racially diverse. California’s population of young people, aged 18-29. These populations are broadly similar. This bigger picture, however, masks substantial variation in the enrollment patterns of Figure 1. California Population (18-29) California’s higher education population. and California Public Undergraduate ATTAINMENT DEGREE BLACK IN UNDERINVESTS SYSTEMATICALLY CALIFORNIA 50% Population by Race/Ethnicity 45% 44% 40% CA POPULATION 18-29 YEARS OLD 30% 31% UNDERGRADUATE POPULATION 25% 20% 17% 14% 10% 6% 5% .3% .4% 4% 4% .3% 5% 0 BLACK LATINX AMERICAN INDIAN/ ASIAN AMERICAN, WHITE MULTI- UNKNOWN ALASKA NATIVE NATIVE HAWAIIAN, ETHNICITY/ PACIFIC ISLANDER OTHER 3 Siqueiros, M. (2020). Left Out: California’s Higher Education Governing Boards Do Not Reflect the Racial and Gender Diversity of California and its Student Body. Los Angeles, CA: Campaign for College Opportunity. Retrieved from: https:// collegecampaign.org/portfolio/left-out-governance-2020/ Historical inequities Figure 2. California Public Higher Education — Race/ have limited access for Ethnicity as Share of Segment Population, 2018-19 underrepresented minorities to the more prestigious and 100% better-funded University of 10% 16% 20% California. 25% Indeed the UC only recently accepted a 23% 80% class in which Latinx students comprise 24% the largest category of students – 36 percent – for the first time in the system’s history.1 As can be seen in 14% Figure 1, however, Latinx residents 60% comprise 45 percent of the state’s 18- 16% 29 year old population. Furthermore, 31% admission and enrollment are two very 45% different concepts. As can be seen 41% in Figure 2, African-American/Black 40% students account for four percent of UC students and Latinx students account for 22 percent of the UC student population. These numbers are six 22% percent and 45 percent, respectively, 20% at the California Community Colleges. Figure 2 also shows the relative populations of the three segments FOLLOW THE MONEYFOLLOW – There are over 2 million California 6% 4% 4% Community College students, 0 CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY CAL STATE UNIVERSITY U OF CALIFORNIA compared to about 480,000 CSU COLLEGES (N=2,089,209) (N=481,210) (N=268,510) students and 268,000 UC students 4 across the various campuses. BLACK LATINX AANHPI WHITE OTHER African-American/Black and Latinx students Figure 3 shows the public higher education enrollment in California broken down by race and system. Across account for more than half of the CA demographic subgroups, community colleges educate the Community College population, but only a vast majority of students. Even among Asian American, quarter of the UC population. Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander students, the group with the lowest share enrolled in community colleges, almost two-thirds of students attend a community college. A much greater share of African-American/Black and Latinx ATTAINMENT DEGREE BLACK IN UNDERINVESTS SYSTEMATICALLY CALIFORNIA students – roughly four in five – attend the state’s community Figure 3. Enrollment in CA Public colleges. Higher Education Segment by Race/ Ethnicity CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY OF COLLEGES UNIVERSITY CALIFORNIA 100% 80% 80% 79% 75% 64% 60% 40% 20% 17% 17% 18% 5 13% 16% 9% 7% 5% 0 BLACK LATINX AANHPPI WHITE Four out of five African-American/Black and Latinx students the number of enrolled students. Though the CA Community are enrolled in a CA Community College, compared to Colleges system does receive four times the revenue of the three out of four White students, and three out of five Asian UC system, the community college population is several American/Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander. times larger than that of the UC. Given the community colleges’ massive population, the overall average per- Funding patterns are different across the various systems. student appropriation is just under $6,000. Table 1 shows the Net Educational Appropriations for each of the three segments, as well as the headcount populations for the 2018-2019 year. These data do not include money sent On a per-student basis, the UC is funded at to campuses in the form of Cal Grant tuition assistance. To calculate overall per-student funding, we add together the almost TWICE the rate of the CA Community total state funding provided to each system and divide by Colleges. Table 1. Net Appropriations and Student Headcounts University of California State California Community California University Colleges Net Educational Appropriations $2,594,485,000 $3,984,878,000 $10,230,478,000 Student Headcount 268,510 481,210 2,089,209 FOLLOW THE MONEYFOLLOW Dollars per Student $9,663 $8,281 $4,897 6 Amounts to $5,921 per student when averaged across the three systems. These enrollment patterns, Figure 4. California Net Education Appropriations by when combined with the Student Race/Ethnicity greater per-student funding provided to the four-year systems relative to the CCC, BLACK LATINX AANHPI WHITE AVERAGE $7,000 and the UC relative to the ATTAINMENT DEGREE BLACK IN UNDERINVESTS SYSTEMATICALLY CALIFORNIA CSU, create a system that $6,000 has consistently spent less per African-American/Black $5,000 and per Latinx student than $4,000 it has for each White student $3,000 enrolled. $2,000 To determine average funding for each race, we evenly allocate a system’s $1,000 funding according to the racial composition of the system’s student 0 body. Within each racial group, we 20152016 20162017 20172018 20182019 combine the funding for each system $4,546 $4,873 $5,174 $5,665 and divide by the total number of $4,576 $4,894 $5,196 $5,691 students to arrive at a per-student $5,253 $5,699 $5,874 $6,361 funding figure by racial category. The results of this analysis are presented in $4,787 $5,132 $5,378 $5,866 AVERAGE PER Figure 4. STUDENT SPENDING $4,813 $5,173 $5,431 $5,921 Note: Due to differences between data sets, students who did not identify among the categories displayed were grouped together. These students were included in all calculations, though we opt not to display In an equitable funding model, all four bars within a given year this bar due to difficulties with interpretation. would be the same height. As shown in Figure 4, the average 7 investment per student in 2018-2019 was $5,921. The average investment per African-American/Black student was $5,665. The good news is that per student funding has increased over the past four years – California is one of just seven states where funding had recovered to pre-Great Recession levels2 – and this increase occurs across all groups. Additionally, per-student gaps in state funding by race have narrowed over the years examined in this brief. These gaps, however, remain persistent and pernicious. In the 2018-19 academic year, the gap between per-African- American/Black student funding and per-White student funding was just over $200, compared to $241 four years prior. That gap was $175 for Latinx students relative to their White peers in 2018-19, down from $211 four years prior. Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander students have the highest per-student funding of any racial category. This result stems from the group’s over- representation among UC students – over a third of the UC’s admitted class for 2020 is Asian American,3 and as can be seen in Figure 2 above, 18 percent of AANHPI students are enrolled at a UC, compared to seven percent of African-American/Black students and five percent of Latinx students. We note that there is substantial variation in higher education enrollment patterns within the AANHPI population, though the data used for the analysis does not allow for a California is one of just more nuanced analysis.