A. Online HBCUs

As noted in the Introduction, the Sloan-C reports are mainly based on two kinds of data: enrollment statistics for distance learning courses submitted by chief academic officers and opinions expressed by chief academic officers. Therefore the Sloan-C reports make reference to increases or decreases in student enrollments.

By contrast this report is mainly based on data collected from HBCU Websites as displayed in the January 2007 edition of the Gateway's Distance Learning Directory and in its previous distance learning reports. Therefore the numbers in the following tables refer to the number of HBCUs offering online courses. No inference about the number of students enrolled in these courses can be made.

1. Distance Learning Courses

As can be seen from Table A1 and Chart A1 (below), 11 more HBCUs offered distance learning courses in 2007 than in 2006. Whereas 29 of the 103 HBCUs offered distance learning courses in 2006, 40 offered distance learning courses in 2007. This change represented an increase of 38 percent.

Table A1. Distance Learning Courses

Chart A1. Percent HBCUs Offering Distance Learning Courses

2.Courseware Platforms

In 2007, 82.5 percent of all HBCUs (33 out of 40) used one of the Blackboard/WebCT company's learning management systems for their distance learning courses.

Table A2. Learning Management Systems (LMS)

3. Types of Courses

Table A3 (below) shows the number of HBCUs that offered various kinds of distance learning courses. The first row shows the number of HBCUs that offered any kind of non-credit courses; the second row shows the number that offered any courses for credit. A subset of the second row also offered enough credit courses to enable students to earn degrees. The number of HBCUs offering degree programs are shown in the next four rows.

Some few HBCUs offered credit and non-credit courses. Some offered credit courses, but did not offer degrees via distance learning. And some offered online degree programs. Unfortunately, the DLL's data for degree programs in 2006 was incomplete, i.e., the number of HBCUs offering Associates, Bachelors, and Masters degrees in 2006 is not in our databases.

Two more HBCUs offered non-credit distance learning courses in 2007 than in 2006, but eight more offered credit courses. In both years, more HBCUs offered credit courses via distance learning than non-credit courses.

Table A3. Types of Distance Learning Courses

B. Types of HBCUs Offering Online Courses

1. Public vs Private HBCUs

As can be seen from Table B1 (below), in both 2006 and 2007, the public HBCUs are far more active in distance learning than the private HBCUs. Indeed, between 2006 and 2007 the public HBCUs increased their lead. In 2006 almost half (49%) of the public HBCUs offered some kind of distance learning courses (credit or non-credie) vs 8% of the private HBCUs. And in 2007 two-thirds of the public HBCUs (67%) offered distance learning courses (credit or non-credit) compared to 12% of the private HBCUs.

Table B1. Public vs Private HBCUs

2. Types of Public and Private HBCUs

This contrast between public and private activity is even more striking when HBCUs are disaggregated into their two year and four year subgroups.

• For example, as can be seen from Table B2 (below), in 2007 ten out of eleven public two year HBCUs are involved in distance learning (91%), whereas neither of the private two year HBCUs offers distance learning courses.
  
  
• Similar contrasts can be seen between the four year HBCUs. In 2006 and 2007 public four year HBCUs were five times as likely to offer distance learning courses as private HBCUs.

Table B2. Four Year vs Two Year HBCUs

Chart B3. Percent Four Year and Two Year HBCUs

3. Courses in 2007

Although we don't have comparable data for 2006, the types of courses offered in 2007, as shown in Table B3 (below), bears closer inspection. In each category, the public HBCUs are far more active than the private HBCUs.

Table B3. Types of Courses Offered in 2007

C. Graduation Rates

Four, five, and six year graduation rates are shown in Tables C1, C2, and C3 respectively:

• Table C1 identifies the HBCUs having the ten highest four year graduation rates. In other words the numbers shown in the % column indicate the percentage of a recent freshman class that graduated within four years.
  
  
• Table C2 identifies the HBCUs having the ten highest five year graduation rates. These figures indicate the percentage of a recent freshman class that graduated in either four or five years.
  
  
• Table C3 identifies the HBCUs having the ten highest six year graduation rates. These figures indicate the percentage of a recent freshman class that graduated in either four, five, or six years.

These statistics were obtained from the U.S. Department of Education's COOL Website. (Note that Xavier University's graduation rates did not appear in the IPEDS database accessed via the COOL Website in January 2007 due to problems caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.)

The table also displays a "Y" (for "yes") in columns that indicate whether the HBCU offered any distance learning credit courses, distance learning Associates degrees, or distance learning Bachelors degrees.

For the purposes of this report, the most significant finding implied by the data in these tables is as follows:

• Distance learning is not associated with the highest graduation rates.

This result is so surprising that a substantial portion of the final section of the report will be devoted to the development of a conceptual framework that will help us understand why such a negative relationship exists at this time.

Table C1. Top 10 HBCUs Having Highest Four Year Graduation Rates

Table C2. Top 10 HBCUs Having Highest Five Year Graduation Rates

Table C3. Top 10 HBCUs Having Highest Six Year Graduation Rates