Statistics Regarding African American Males
- 86 percent of black fourth graders cannot read at grade level.
- On average, African American and Hispanic 12th grade students read at approximately the same level as white eighth graders.
- The 12th grade reading scores of African American males were significantly lower than those for men and women across every other racial and ethnic group.
- Although they represent only 17.1 percent of public school students, in 2006 African American students accounted for 37.4 percent of total suspensions and 37.9 percent of total expulsions nationwide
- Only 41 percent of African American males graduate from high school in the United States.
- In 1995, 16 percent of African American males in their 20s who did not go to college were in jail; a decade later, it’s grown to 21 percent.
- The arrest rate among African American youth (ages 10-17) was nearly twice the rate of their white peers.
- Nationwide, young black offenders are more than twice as likely to be transferred to adult court than their white counterparts.
- Nearly 60 percent of young offenders serving time in adult state prisons are African American, although African Americans comprise only 15 percent of the youth population.
- Nationwide, 60 percent of the 2,380 offenders serving life without parole for crimes they were convicted of committing as children are African American.
- According to the Centers for Disease Control, homicide is the leading cause of death among African American males aged 15-34 years.
- According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) statistics released in 2008, the homicide rate among Black males ages 10 to 24 is more than double that of Hispanic and White males in the same age group.