<p>See: [The</a> Graduation Rate Gap :: Inside Higher Ed :: Higher Education’s Source for News, and Views and Jobs](<a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/04/21/gradrates]The”>http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/04/21/gradrates)</p>
<p>*Not surprisingly, the report finds that some elite colleges with very competitive admissions for all students have hardly any gaps at all. But the report draws attention to institutions that do not either have billions in their endowments or sit atop the rankings that nonetheless have small or no gaps in the graduation rates of black and white students. At Florida State University, for example, the report notes that the black graduation rate tops the white graduation rate, 72 percent to 69 percent. The same is true at the College of Charleston; George Mason, Towson and Winthrop Universities; the State University of New York campuses at Albany and Stony Brook; and the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa all of which also have black graduation rates of at least 60 percent.</p>
<p>If there is a single factor that seems to distinguish colleges and universities that have truly made a difference on behalf of minority students, it is attention, the report says. Successful colleges pay attention to graduation rates. They monitor year-to-year change, study the impact of different interventions on student outcomes, break down the numbers among different student populations, and continuously ask themselves how they could improve.*</p>