Lost on campus, as colleges look abroad
One day this fall, Rachel Domond, a third-year student at Northeastern University, conducted a counting exercise that has become all too familiar for many African-American students. She sat on the red couches on the second floor of the Curry Student Center and scanned the room for others who looked like her.
It didn’t take long to count. It never does.
“I see one black person over there,” she said, motioning across the room to a group of about 40 students. “But for the most part, I see white faces, and I see all of these international students.”
For many black students in Boston, the word “diversity” is taking on a global, multicultural meaning that has little to do with them. Boston has become a leader in attracting foreign students, but at the same time it lags behind other parts of the country when it comes to enrolling black college students from closer to home.
In this Athens of America, packed with top colleges, the enrollment of African-American students in Greater Boston’s universities was less than 7 percent in 2015, notably less than most other major metro areas, according to the most recent federal data on students at every level. Nationally, the average for black enrollment is 11 percent.
