J.D. Pooley/AP Photo

Who’s going to college? Who’s graduating? And what are the differences in life outcomes for people who go to college compared with people who don’t? At the Education Writers Association, we’ve put together several datasets to try to answer those questions.

Some of the datasets we compiled confirm conventional wisdom. Others were surprising, like the data on how long women have been outpacing men in degree attainment. Put together, the information we gleaned depicts a higher education landscape that is struggling to respond to demographic changes in the broader U.S. populace.

College Completion by Race

Below is a chart that visualizes the number of people who completed a bachelor’s degree by race. The top of the chart shows the totals, while the bottom of the chart displays those numbers in percentages. Hover over the bars below to see specific numbers and percentages.

College Enrollment by Race

While whites are far more over-represented among students earning degrees, college enrollment tells a different story. In 1976 roughly 85 percent of all students in colleges and universities were white, but that figure dropped to less than two-thirds in 2011, according to U.S. Department of Education data. The chart below captures the enrollment figures the federal government collected from two- and four-year universities. Click around the bars for more information about a given year.

Broadly, the data visualized above show that the black share of total enrollment between 1976 and 2011 nearly doubled; the Hispanic share more than quadrupled. Although more underserved minorities are getting through the campus door, far fewer are donning caps and gowns, as shown in the college completion chart above. However, recent research has found that students who attended some college are still likely to earn more than those who stopped their education after earning high school diplomas. In recent years researchers have focused on paring the number of college dropouts to increase the workforce’s share of college-degree holders.