Howard University and Google Propel Opportunity for Under-represented High School Students Nationwide

In partnership with non-profit National Education Equity Lab, Howard University and Google will offer Google Data Analytics Certificate and six widely transferable college credits to high school students across the country during the school day

NEW YORK, July 22, 2024 — Howard University and the National Education Equity Lab (Ed Equity Lab) today announced a new partnership with Google, which will enable high school students from underserved communities to earn a Google Data Analytics Certificate and six Howard University college credits before graduating from high school. 

“We believe that higher education institutions have a responsibility to provide opportunities that open up new pipelines of diverse talent into in-demand careers. We must start earlier to not only pave the way for success in college but set students up for lifelong success,” said Dr. Bourama Toni, Professor and Chairman of the Department of Mathematics at Howard University. “Too often, graduates of under-resourced high schools have been gated out of opportunities in well-paid, in-demand careers in the STEM fields because they have not had the requisite training in math and data fundamentals. We’re changing that. We’re excited to expand our partnership with Ed Equity Lab, and this collaboration with Google allows us to extend our impact.” 

Starting this Fall 2024, students will participate in a year-long course to earn a Google Data Analytics Certificate, as well as six widely transferable college credits from Howard University upon successful completion of the courses. Students will not only build essential data analysis skills and fluency with critical platforms like Tableau and SQL, but also participate in hands-on projects and case studies that will expose them to a variety of business, engineering, social science, and life science fields. The certificate builds a working knowledge that enables them to be competitive the minute they step into the job market.

“In today’s rapidly evolving economy, it’s essential that we’re drawing on the entire talent of our country. That means ensuring young scholars in under-resourced high schools have the opportunity to build the skills and knowledge that we know will be required of them to thrive,”  said Leslie Cornfeld, founder and CEO of Ed Equity Lab.  “This collaboration is about helping to develop a generation of talent ready to tackle the challenges and opportunities of tomorrow.”

The Google Career Certificates program equips people with job-ready skills for entry-level positions in six growing fields including data analytics—with no experience required. Google’s entry-level Data Analytics Certificate is the most popular certificate on Coursera globally, with thousands of successful graduates. The program includes an employer consortium of over 150 companies that are interested in hiring the Google Certificate graduates including DC-based employers such as Siemens,, Marriott International, and of course Google.

Students will also have access to Google’s new AI Essentials course that is designed and taught by AI experts at Google. 

“The opportunities created by technology should be available to everyone—all students deserve access to training for high-paying, high-growth careers fields ” said Lisa Gevelber, Founder, Grow with Google. “We’re proud to collaborate with National Ed Equity Lab and Howard University to help high school students across the country earn an industry recognized Google Career Certificate, obtain college credit, and advance their economic opportunities for years to come.”

This is the fifth course that Howard University has offered to high school students since first partnering with the Ed Equity Lab in 2020 — including courses in environmental science, leadership studies, and algebra — and more than 3,100 students from 140 high schools nationally have benefitted from the opportunity. The National Education Equity Lab partners with top colleges and universities, like Howard University, to offer college credit-bearing courses, and supports, in under-resourced Title 1 high school classrooms across the country. Students take actual college courses from top professors, co-taught by teachers at their high schools, and earn a college transcript from the offering institution upon successful completion. Starting in 2019 with a single Harvard humanities course in 25 high schools, the Ed Equity Lab has now served 25,000 students in more than 150 cities across 31 states. 

To learn more about this opportunity, email info@edequitylab.org.

About Howard University 

Founded in 1867, Howard University is a private research university that is comprised of 14 schools and colleges. Students pursue more than 140 programs of study leading to undergraduate, graduate, and professional degrees. The University operates with a commitment to Excellence in Truth and Service and has produced one Schwarzman Scholar, three Marshall Scholars, four Rhodes Scholars, 12 Truman Scholars, 25 Pickering Fellows, and more than 165 Fulbright recipients. Howard also produces more on-campus African American Ph.D. recipients than any other university in the United States. For more information on Howard University, visit www.howard.edu.

About the National Education Equity Lab

Founded in 2019, the National Education Equity Lab has developed a transformative college access and success model to prepare and empower low-income high school students to attend the college that’s the best match for them. For the first time ever, the country’s top colleges and universities have come together to offer their own college credit-bearing courses, assisted by the Ed Equity Lab’s robust technology and network of supports, as a national equity and mobility effort to students in low-income (Title I) high school classrooms, at scale — and at no cost to students. These universities are leading the nation in advancing and supporting talent beyond their gates, by providing college credit-bearing courses, and supports into teacher-led high school classrooms across 31 states, at no cost to the 25,000 scholars served to date. The Ed Equity Lab is on track to serve 1 million scholars over the next decade. 

About Grow with Google 

Grow with Google was started in 2017 to help Americans grow their skills, careers, and businesses. It provides training, tools, and expertise to help small business owners, veterans and military families, jobseekers and students, educators, startups, and developers. Since Grow with Google’s inception, it has helped more than 11 million Americans develop new skills. Grow with Google has a network of more than 9,000 partner organizations like libraries, schools, small business development centers, chambers of commerce, and nonprofits to help people coast-to-coast.