• Statewide
• Minneapolis

Inequities in Graduation Rates

Black male students in Minneapolis graduated at half the rate of White male students in 2005/6 and considerably below the national average. The racial achievement gap is much wider than the national average. The graduation rate for Black male students continues to improve but is still less than half the Benchmark.

The Benchmark for graduation rates of Black male students for school districts enrolling more than 10,000 Black male students is 82% (Fort Bend, Texas).

Discipline, Special Education, and Advanced Placement Inequities

The number of out-of-school suspensions given to Black male students in the Minneapolis public schools was equivalent to twenty-four percent of the city's Black, non-Hispanic male student population and the percentage of out-of-school suspensions given to White male students in Minneapolis was equivalent to six percent, in the 2004/5 school year, as reported to the Office of Civil Rights of the U. S. Department of Education. One hundred thirty-five Black (and five White) male students were expelled from the Minneapolis schools.

Black, non-Hispanic male students were classified as Gifted/Talented less than half as often as White non-Hispanic male students in the Minneapolis public schools and placed in Mental Retardation classifications at a higher rate than that for White male students. If Black male students had been admitted to Gifted/Talent programs at the same rate as White male students, at least an additional 800 would have had that opportunity.

Proportionate to enrollment, more than six times as many White male students as Black male students in the Minneapolis public schools in 2004/5 were allowed to participate in Mathematics and eight times as many in Science Advanced Placement courses.