The pool of associate degree graduates qualified to apply for police or other vocational-technical-college graduate jobs in Ferguson is reflected here. Also shown is the hope and investment made via the African-American Male Initiative at this community college in Ferguson:
"When U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder landed in St. Louis Wednesday morning, a community college in Ferguson was his first destination.
St. Louis Community College at Florissant Valley is where the nation’s chief lawyer met with students and community leaders in an attempt to quell the most heated racial flare-up in recent American memory. But the Ferguson campus is also where scores of the region’s young people set their sights, hoping higher education can offset the burdens of a disadvantaged upbringing. Many youth in the predominantly black area are not unlike Michael Brown, the college-bound teenager shot and killed by a Ferguson police officer.
Even on campus, though, these students face long odds. Many see the college as a way out, said Marc Wallace, who graduated from Florissant Valley in 2005.
But few earn a degree. No more than a quarter of students graduate from the campus or transfer to a four-year institution, college officials said.……
A ‘Safe Haven’
The college is half a mile from West Florissant Avenue, the commercial thoroughfare along which protesters have marched in the days following Brown’s death. Protesters burned down a QuikTrip gas station on West Florissant on Sunday…….
"The area’s young people, then, naturally look to Florissant Valley as a way to advance. The college tries to attract and mentor the low-income African-American students who live in the surrounding area. “That’s one of the groups we are focusing on,” Bell said.
In 2009, boosted by a pair of Education Department grants, St. Louis Community College launched a program known as the African-American Male Initiative, housed on the Florissant Valley and Forest Park campuses. The mentoring program, designed to boost the enrollment and retention of African-American men, served 349 students in the 2013-14 academic year, a Florissant Valley spokesperson said.
But despite the college’s efforts, only a fraction of students successfully use Florissant Valley as a launch pad. The campus’s graduation rate is 6.4 percent, said Dan Kimack, St. Louis Community College’s director of public information and marketing.
And 19 percent of Florissant Valley students transfer to a four-year institution. District-wide rates – meaning average rates for all four St. Louis Community College campuses – are higher. The district has a 9.9 percent graduation rate and a 22.4 percent transfer rate, Kimack said."
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/...aduation-rates