African American Male Initiative aims to increase achievement and enrollment f

In response to the issues surrounding African American male student achievement and low enrollment of African American male college students, the Ivy Tech Indianapolis campus has developed the African American male strategic enrollment plan for central Indiana.

The plan is based on best practices and theories from an extensive literature review on college enrollment, retention, and completion. The goal is to create a roadmap for how to best make significant and immediate progress for African American male students at Ivy Tech Community College.

Outreach efforts to 730 males began with a spring check-in email to ask about the semester and offering assistance for registration for summer and fall terms. Currently, Ivy Tech’s Zoom check-ins are conducted to talk with African American males about this initiative and what they would like to see as well as how can we build a program together are being planned.

Ivy Tech Indianapolis’ Fall 2019 to Spring 2020 retention African American males was 66%. The goal is to increase the retention to 70%, which would be an additional 52 students.

By being consistent with communication and opportunities to connect with African American male students, we can begin to see where the struggles are occurring and offer our assistance and support. When we create these opportunities for dialogue and create a culture of support we know that the opportunity gaps will begin to close, and we will see the rates for African American males begin to trend in a positive direction in the areas of enrollment, retention, and completion at Ivy Tech Community College Central Indiana.