Rationale: On average, students from racial and ethnic groups under-represented in STEM take longer to get through undergraduate school and graduate schools. The Council of Graduate Schools reported that White and Asian students took an average of 7.7 years to receive their PhDs while Black students took an average of 9.5 years. Some of these differences may simply be a reflection of differences in time-to-degree by field, minority students less likely than their respective counterparts to be in science and engineering fields where times-to-degree are shorter.¹ The University of California reported that White students receive their bachelor's degree in, on average, 4.1 years, while Black and Latino students averaged 4.5 years.² Nationally, 46% of majority STEM undergraduates completed their STEM degree in 5 years, compared to 27% of minority STEM undergraduates.³ Professional advancement for minority workers is also slower.⁴ If studies in these areas don't take the time differences into account, they will show larger race/ethnic differences than is actually the case.