New Census Data Show Minority Gains in Bachelor's Degree Attainment

The Chronicle of Higher Education
February 23, 2012
By Emma Roller

Washington

New data from the U.S. Census Bureau give a more detailed look at the 61 million Americans over the age of 25 who hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and show strong gains in degree attainment among minority groups over the past decade.

From 2001 to 2011, the number of Hispanics 25 and over with a bachelor's degree or higher rose by 80 percent, the figures show. Among blacks, the increase was 47 percent, and among non-Hispanic whites, it was 24 percent.

Full Story: http://chronicle.com/article/New-Census-Data-Show-Minority/130910/?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en

Census count finds decreasing white population in 15 states

The Washington Post
By Carol Morello, Published: September 29

Non-Hispanic whites are a dwindling share of the U.S. population, with their numbers dropping in the Northeast and Midwest and growing only modestly in the South and West, the Census Bureau said Thursday.
Whites declined in 15 states, almost all in the industrial and farming states from Massachusetts to Pennsylvania, and from Kansas to Ohio. They also declined in California and three Southern states, including Maryland.

A Census Bureau analysis of the 2010 count showed that the number of non-Hispanic whites rose over the decade from 194.5 million to 197 million, but the 1.2 percent growth rate fell far short of the national increase of 9.7 percent. Non-Hispanic whites are now 64 percent of the population, down from 69 percent a decade ago.

Full Story: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/census-count-finds-decreasing-white-population-in-15-states/2011/09/29/gIQA2aDJ8K_story.html?wpisrc=nl_cuzheads

Minorities Now Form Majority in One-Third of Most-Populous Counties

New York Times
August 9, 2007
By SAM ROBERTS

In a further sign of the United States’ growing diversity, nonwhites now make up a majority in almost one-third of the most-populous counties in the country and in nearly one in 10 of all 3,100 counties, according to an analysis of census results to be released today.
The shift reflects the growing dispersal of immigrants and the suburbanization of blacks and Hispanics pursuing jobs generated by whites moving to the fringes of metropolitan areas.
From July 1, 2005, to July 1, 2006, metropolitan Chicago edged out Honolulu in Asian population, and Washington inched ahead of El Paso in the number of Hispanic residents. In black population, Houston overtook Los Angeles.
“The new wave of immigration, along with its continued dispersal to the suburbs and Sun Belt, is transforming the places which are now being classified as multiethnic and majority minority,” said William H. Frey, a demographer with the Brookings Institution.
“The new melting pots are not large international gateways,” Professor Frey said, adding, “Rather, many are fast-growing suburbs themselves.”
In 36 counties with more than 500,000 residents each, non-Hispanic whites are now a minority, up from 29 counties of that size in 2000.
From 2005 to 2006 alone, eight other mostly less-populous counties shifted to a majority of minorities, the Census Bureau said. They were Denver, Colo.; East Baton Rouge Parish, La.; Winkler, Waller and Wharton in Texas; Blaine, Mont.; Colfax, N.M.; and Manassas Park, Va., an independent city that is considered the equivalent of a county.
[For the entire story, go to: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/09/us/09census.html

For the US Census Bureau press release and report, go to: http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/population/010482.html ]