Beyond The Degree

📘 Beyond the Degree

How Higher Education Shapes Black Leadership and Career Success in America

By Crystal Y. Coleman (Kris)



What happens after the diploma?

For generations, Black families have viewed college as a gateway to economic mobility, personal growth, and community uplift. But for far too many, the promise of higher education has come with a paradox: rising degrees, but stagnant outcomes.

In Beyond the Degree, educator and advocate Crystal Y. Coleman—known as Kris—delivers a powerful examination of how race, policy, and systemic barriers continue to shape the educational and leadership journeys of African Americans. Backed by data, lived experience, and deep cultural insight, this groundbreaking book explores how Black students are navigating college—and what happens when they graduate into unequal workplaces.

🔍 Inside this book:

• The truth about wage gaps, underemployment, and student debt
• Why Black students are tracked into certain majors—and how it impacts their future
• How leadership pipelines fail Black professionals
• The cultural weight of the degree and the emotional toll it carries
• Strategies for transforming access into equity and degrees into true power

✨ Perfect for:

• Parents, students, and educators
• DEI professionals and higher ed leaders
• Black scholars, mentors, and community organizers
• Anyone committed to closing the opportunity gap