TABLE 6.-Number and percentage of Negro high-school graduates of 1929, by sex, who were continuing their education in 1930 in 17 Southern States and the District of Columbia

Eighty-three institutions of higher learning for Negroes reported in 1931-32 to the Office of Education. These institutions had a total enrollment in the regular session of 30,499 students. Of this number, 7,285, or 23.9 percent, were classified as preparatory. Men constituted 13,685, or 44.8 percent, of the total enrollment. Sixty of the 83 institutions were 4-year colleges. Sixty percent of the students in 4-year colleges were in private 4-year colleges of which there were 39; in the 18 publicly controlled institutions, 39.9 percent of the total 4-year college enrollment was found.

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5. EXPENDITURES FOR HIGHER EDUCATION

In order to get some sort of comparison of the expenditures for higher education in Negro and in white colleges, it was necessary to take for comparison colleges which had a certain common denominator. For instance, there would be no point in choosing even the largest 10 Negro colleges and the largest white colleges and attempting to compare their endowments, receipts, and expenditures. The nearest identical type of college maintained separately for Negroes and whites is

FIGURE VII.-Percentage increase in collegiate enrollment of Negro men and women biennially from 1919-20 to 1931-32 over 1917-18.

the land-grant college, established out of Federal funds even before the Civil War as a result of the Morrill Act. Each year the Federal Government allots to each land-grant college $50,000.

To ascertain how much is spent and received each year for the Negro and the white land-grant colleges, the 17 Negro colleges which exist are compared with the white land-grant colleges which exist in the same States, in table 7. The figures listed for "educational and eneral receints" include student fees income

TABLE 7.-Receipts and expenditures for each student of college grade in 17 Negro land-grant colleges and 17 white land-grant colleges in the same States, 1932–33

Source: Computed from data in Statistics of Higher Education, 1933-34.

from endowment, receipts from public sources for current expenses, private gifts and grants, sales and services, and other receipts for educational purposes. These figures do not include auxiliary enterprises and activities, noneducational receipts, extension of physical plant, or increase of permanent funds. Likewise, the expenditures which are listed include administration and general control, resident instruction and nonbudgeted research, organized research, libraries, extension, and operation and maintenance of physical plant. Not included in the expenditures are auxiliary enterprises, noneducational expenditures, and capital outlays. Unfortunately, the comparison is not very favorable. Both the receipts and the expenditures for the white land-grant colleges are almost double those of the Negro, even though the Office of Education defines the aim of the land-grant college "to serve equally the people in every part of the State in which it is located."

6. LENGTH OF SCHOOL TERM

(NOTE. The data attached are not exactly what Mr. Givens suggested. White rural schools are not listed; the rural schools are undifferentiated. However, this probably makes a more favorable comparison since, if Negro schools were excluded, the rural average would be raised. It is already higher than the Negro school average.)

Little progress is observed in the Negro schools when one compares the length of school term of white, Negro, and rural schools. For the 8 years considered, the white schools averaged a little over 163 days a year; the Negro schools averaged a little over 137 days. The rural schools for 4 years averaged 152 days. Thus, the white pupils had school opportunities open to them over a school month longer than did the Negroes, and the rural pupils had 15 more school days per year than did the Negroes.

There is, however, one encouraging factor, namely, the progressive increase in length of school year in the case of Negro schools. While the white schools are seen to have declined even in years of prosperity, the Negro schools have been constantly increasing. Columns 6, 7, 8, and 9 of table 8 show the averages for TABLE 8.-Length of school term (days) in white schools, Negro schools, and undifferentiated rural schools in 17 States, 1927-34

State

White schools

Negro schools

Undifferentiated rural schools

1927-28 1929-30 1931-32 1933-34 1927-28 1929-30 1931-32 1933-34 1927-301 1931-32 1933-34

2 Data for all 17 States summarized in Office of Education, Bulletin (1935) No. 13, make this average 131 Source: Combined tables from the Biennial Surveys of Education for the years indicated.

Negro schools to be 140, 132, 135, and 142. As footnote 2 indicates, when all data for the 17 States are combined, including that for Kentucky and for West Virginia which are given in summary form in Office of Education Bulletin (1935) No. 13, the average for 1927-28 is reduced to 131. Thus, there is a constant increase in length of school years for Negro schools. Over the period shown in this table, the increase for Negro schools is one of 8 percent; white schools showed a decrease.

7. PERCENTAGE OF THE NEGRO POPULATION THAT IS RURAL

The American Negro has not been primarily an urban group. The very nature of their traditional function in American life has held them to the land. Even now, 60 years after their liberation, they fall 13 percent under the national average for urban distribution and 17 percent above the national average for rural farm distribution. In other words, while almost 58 percent of the total white population lives in cities, only 44 percent of the Negro population lives in cities; and while 23 percent of the white population lives in rural farm areas, over 39

percent of the Negroes live in such areas. Only 5,000,000 of the Nation's 12,000,000 Negroes live in cities of over 2,500 population. It is clear, then, that the Negro is primarily a rural inhabitant.

From table 9 it is clear, also, that the Negroes in rural areas have the greatest proportion of school-age youth. In 16 Southern States which are commonly TABLE 9.-Number and percentage of Negroes 5 to 19 years of age in the total urban rural-farm, and rural nonfarm population in 16 States, 1930

reputed to have the greatest Negro concentration, over 40 percent of the ruralfarm Negroes are of school age. Of the urban Negroes only slightly over onefourth are of school age. (The last column of table 9 may be of interest to anyone concerned with the educational problems of Negroes. Each of the 16 South

ern States' population of Negroes is listed with the number and percentage of that population which is aged 5 to 19 years. The range of youth proportions goes from 42 percent in South Carolina to 27 percent in Kentucky with the regional average being about 35 percent. This means that one in every three Negroes in the South is of school age.)