One of the most urgent conversations in higher education today is not just about getting into college – it is about getting through it and graduating prepared for meaningful work and a purposeful life.
National data consistently show that earning a bachelor’s degree remains one of the most powerful levers for economic mobility. College graduates earn substantially more and experience significantly lower unemployment over their lifetimes than those without degrees. And yet that promise is not being delivered equally – not across race, not across class, and increasingly, not across gender.
Across New Jersey, male enrollment in college has declined for more than a decade, with men now representing barely 40% of undergraduates at many public institutions. For Black and Hispanic/Latinx young men, the picture is even more troubling: Statewide data show lower college-going rates, lower first-year retention and significantly worse four- and six-year graduation outcomes compared with their female peers. These are not new problems. They are deepening ones.
Credit: (Daniel Jean)These gaps have persisted despite decades of well-intentioned initiatives. Programs like the Educational Opportunity Fund, which has supported first-generation, low-income New Jersey students since 1968, and federal TRIO initiatives since 1964, have demonstrated that intentional, sustained support moves the needle. As an EOF alumnus myself, I know firsthand what that investment means: It is not just a financial aid grant, it is the difference between a future success or continuing generational poverty.
EOF and TRIO programs targeting limited-income scholars are strategic data-informed models that help to address the structural barriers young men face: inconsistent academic preparation, dismal social development and the cultural stigma that discourages too many young men from pursuing higher education.
Unfortunately, these programs are limited in funds and a large segment of the population is not able to take advantage of these resources. Access programs have proven their value, yet the populations they were designed to serve remain largely underserved at scale.
Federal data reinforce this urgency. Nationally, Black and Hispanic/Latinx males have the lowest college completion rates of any gender and ethnic group in the country, and New Jersey mirrors these disparities. The enrollment story is one of steady, decades-long shifts. Graduation trends tell the same narrative. From 2020-23, women surpassed 58% of all graduates while men declined to approximately 42%. New Jersey mirrors these trends but with sharper intensity. In 2021-22, women were approaching 60% of the state’s undergraduate population.
This is not a temporary fluctuation. It is a structural and worsening gap that demands deliberate, sustained action.
Enrollment alone was never the finish line. Research from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York shows that many recent graduates remain underemployed, working in jobs that don’t require their degrees. The path from education to career, for too many young men, is neither direct nor equitable. Access is necessary but it is not sufficient.
This is the landscape that makes the work of Male Enrollment and Graduation Alliance , or MEGA, not only relevant, but also necessary. When I co-founded MEGA, my goal was simple yet urgent: to build intentional scalable structures that connect all scholars with mentors and models who can illuminate the path from aspiration to achievement. Too often, higher education conversations shrink to statistics and stand-alone programs. MEGA insists on something more – on people, on pathways and on possibilities.
What sets MEGA apart is that we have been doing this work at Montclair State University for more than 15 years, long before the data made headlines. That commitment shows up in concrete, innovative ways: through Barbershop.edu, which recreates familiar community settings to open conversations about college and career; through the Male Leadership Academy, which develops the next generation of scholar-leaders; and through one of the only male-majority TRIO Upward Bound College Prep programs in the country, a distinction that reflects both the urgency of this work and the depth of our institutional commitment.
It brings together educators, community partners, and industry leaders to strengthen the full scholar lifecycle – from early exposure and recruitment to persistence, graduation and career readiness. While the alliance formally launched in 2022, it grew from more than a decade of statewide conferences and campus-based gatherings built around a single conviction: that education is a tool for equity and empowerment, and that all young men – especially those from first-generation and underrepresented backgrounds – deserve spaces built intentionally for their success.
That growth was evident early in March, when more than 350 high school students, college scholars, educators and community leaders gathered at Montclair State University for the 2026 MEGA Symposium. This year’s theme – From Passion to Profession – captured the challenge that higher education must meet: helping scholars connect their interests, purpose and career goals in ways that prepare them for a fast-changing workforce.
Participants represented a remarkable cross-section of New Jersey education: high schools from Newark, East Orange, Paterson, Trenton and Plainfield alongside college scholars and professionals from Montclair State, Rutgers, Princeton, Rowan, and community colleges across Mercer, Union, Middlesex and Hudson counties. That breadth reflects a truth MEGA has always insisted upon: Scholar success is not the work of a single institution. It is the work of an ecosystem, and collaboration across sectors ensures that opportunity does not expire at the point of admission.
When young men see leaders who share their experiences and backgrounds, something shifts. They stop asking whether college is for them and start imagining what is possible. After more than 15 years of organizing these convenings, I have witnessed how one meaningful conversation – the right mentor, the right moment – can redirect the entire trajectory of a scholar’s life. I am living proof of that.
EOF and TRIO programs across New Jersey have quietly produced thousands of professionals, educators and community leaders who went on to give back exactly what was given to them. Those transformations, quiet and profound, are what MEGA exists to cultivate. And they are why the work continues.
