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Abstract This study examines the diversity of institutional human capital at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) by analyzing faculty educational backgrounds using a large data set on faculty hiring and placement. The analysis includes approximately four thousand faculty members employed at 10 research-intensive R2 HBCUs between 2011 and 2020. The results reveal that the 10 R2 HBCUs primarily hired tenure-track faculty from predominantly White R1 institutions. In contrast, HBCUs hired approximately 20% of their own graduates, while less than 10% of hires came from other HBCUs. Regarding placement, about 60% of HBCU graduates sought employment at HBCUs, while only a small number found employment at R1 institutions. Notably, Howard University placed 30 graduates at R1 institutions. This downward placement pattern underscores a significant trend: most HBCU hires are from R1 institutions, while HBCU graduates primarily find employment at institutions with lower research intensity. Understanding these patterns is crucial for addressing disparities in faculty representation and supporting the growth of Black professionals in academia. 

Abstract Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) play a foundational role in promoting equality in U.S. higher education and society. Studying faculty transitions and research dynamics at HBCUs is crucial to understanding and addressing these institutions’ challenges, such as the brain drain and its relationships with faculty research practices. By tracking the affiliation changes of 139 professors and their research outcomes (consisting of 4,269 publications) and comparing them with a matched control group with similar backgrounds, we revealed a moving penalty for professors moving from Predominantly White Institutions (PWIs) to HBCUs, who experienced declines in research productivity and citation impact. In contrast, professors transitioning from HBCUs to PWIs benefited from the moving premium of increasing high-impact publications. Professors at HBCUs tend to increase their collaborations with PWIs before transitioning, while those moving to PWIs reduce their collaborations with HBCUs. Our findings highlight the ongoing challenges HBCUs face and underscore the need for comprehensive strategies to strengthen these institutions’ research functionality and ultimately their overall academic standing. 

ABSTRACT Academic mobility has accelerated in part due to recent civil rights movements and higher levels of social mobility. This trend increases the threat of brain drain from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), which already face significant logistical challenges despite broad success in the advancement of Black professionals. We aim to examine this threat from a Science of Science perspective by collecting diachronic data for a large‐scale longitudinal analysis of HBCU faculty’s academic mobility. Our study uses Memento, manual collection, and web scraping to aggregate historical identifiers (URI‐Ms) of webpages from 35 HBCUs across multiple web archives. We are thus able to extend the use of “canonicalization” to associate past versions of webpages that resided at different URIs with their current URI allowing for a more accurate view of the pages over time. In this paper we define and execute a novel data collection method which is essential for our examination of HBCU human capital changes and supports a movement towards a more equitable academic workforce.