Vol. 24., No. 12	January 21, 1999

Columbia Is Best in Ivy League for African Americans

BY A. DUNLAP-SMITH

Columbia ranks first in the Ivy League and among the best universities overall for African-American students, according to a new survey and ranking published this month in Black Enterprise magazine.

The University is 15th in the "Top 50 Colleges for African Americans," the magazine's 10-page special report on the survey, which based its findings not only on a school's academic strengths but also its social environment and graduation rate for black students.

Columbia is the survey's highest ranked Ivy League school, trailed by Harvard in 28th position. Places 1-9 are filled by historically black colleges and universities, with Spelman and Morehouse, the sibling schools in Atlanta, at one and two respectively.

The report also breaks down the ranking into four sub-categories that separate colleges from universities and schools that draw students regionally from those that attract them nationally. In the subcategory of national universities, Columbia ranks third behind Stanford and Georgetown and ahead of Emory and North Carolina.

Thomas LaVeist said that the reason for the survey was "African American students were not doing well at some colleges, because they had not made the right choice. They solely looked at the academic programs without considering the social environment." LaVeist is an associate professor of health and public policy at Johns Hopkins and CEO of DayStar, the company that conducted the survey and created the ranking.

DayStar queried 1,077 African-American professionals at 987 U.S. colleges and universities. The criteria used for including a school in the survey was it had to be an accredited, four-year institution and had to have an African-American enrollment of at least 1.5 percent of the student body.

This is only the second ranking of colleges and universities aimed at African-American high school students and their concerns. The first is published by Black Issues in Higher Education, though it ranks a school exclusively on the number of black students it graduates.

Black Enterprise magazine is a monthly publication for and about the African-American business world. It was founded in 1970 and has a readership of 3.1 million.