HispanicTrending

UT Chancellor says system lacks minority advancement

July 1, 2009
By HOUSTON CHRONICLE

University of Texas System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa told Latino leaders Tuesday that the lack of educational attainment, particularly for minorities, is "a gathering storm" that threatens America's competitiveness.

With only three-fourths of U.S. teens graduating from high schools and only 39 percent of high school graduates entering college, the country is losing a competitive student pipeline for professions that include medicine and health care, the UT leader told the Latino Leaders Network.

"We can no longer risk complacency as we face a looming storm," said Cigarroa, who was being honored as the 2009 Nambe Eagle Leadership Award recipient for his contributions to the Latino community and his achievements in medicine and academia. "We must ensure that the student pipeline remains wonderfully competitive, diverse, open and bountiful."

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that minorities are expected to comprise 54 percent of the overall student population in 2050, and Cigarroa said that more must be done to improve their opportunities in health care, medicine and other fields.

"It pays multiple dividends by helping students enter a profession and improving the availability of health care in a chronically underserved region," he said.

A native of Laredo, Cigarroa reflected on his South Texas upbringing in his speech to 400 people at the Capital Hilton. He recalled leaving the mesquite and brush years ago to attend Yale University.

"The most difficult transition in my life was that transition from Laredo to Yale," Cigarroa said to laughter from a crowd of lawmakers, public officials and students.

When he later left a medical residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore to take a position at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio, a colleague told Cigarroa he was "committing academic suicide."

But Cigarroa later became president of the University of Texas Health Science Center, and was named chancellor of the entire University of Texas system in January.

Mickey Ibarra, founder and chairman of the Latino Leaders Network, said Cigarroa's accomplishments in surgery and medical research "make him one of the foremost Latino medical leaders in the world."

A pediatric and transplant surgeon, Cigarroa received a bachelor's degree from Yale and his medical degree from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.

In 1997, he was part of a surgical team that split a donor liver for transplant into two recipients, the first time the procedure was performed in Texas.

Source: Beaumont Enterprise

Inspired by mentors, critics, immigrant rises to top

June 25, 2009
by Elahe Izadi

Hyattsville native Ronald Hernandez is like a lot of successful students. He received scholarship money to go to a top university and spends long nights studying to become a computer engineer.

But the path to success for Hernandez, 20, was not easy. He immigrated to the United States from El Salvador as a 13-year-old who didn't speak English and is now a rising sophomore at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.

Hernandez was recognized June 11 at the U.S. Hispanic Youth Entrepreneur Education's Hispanic Heroes Award Gala as being a USYEE scholar.

Hernandez said he learned English not only through ESOL classes, but also through efforts he undertook in his free time, like reading and writing English words and listening to music in English.

"Every time I would hear something I didn't know, I would look it up and make sure I knew how to pronounce it," he said.

But the motivation to learn also came from those who doubted him. Hernandez recalled one instance in which a classmate at Kenmoor Middle School in Landover was shocked to learn that Hernandez's grade point average was 3.86. The classmate attributed it to the fact Hernandez was in ESOL classes.

"I wanted to prove myself, that I could do something and I wasn't getting the grades because I was in ESOL," Hernandez said.

He soon graduated out of the ESOL program and was accepted into the Science and Technology magnet program at Eleanor Roosevelt High School in Greenbelt after completing his freshman year at Bladensburg High School. But the possibility of going to college wasn't on his mind until he attended a USHYEE symposium at the campus of University of Maryland, Baltimore County. There, Hernandez learned how to apply for college and scholarships.

It was also there that he met Luis Borunda, president-founder of USHYEE.

Borunda said Hernandez's experience is shared by many youth who attend the now-overnight symposium that spans four days.

"The program puts kids on a college campus, and they sit in college classrooms, they eat college food and they sleep college dorms," Borunda said. "When kids experience that, all of a sudden this institution called ‘college' becomes real and they begin to grasp the idea that they can go to college."

Borunda founded USHYEE in 2004 in response to the high dropout rate of Latinos.

In 2008, the dropout rate for Hispanics in Maryland was 4.61 percent, compared with 3.4 percent for all races, and in Prince George's County it was 3.68 percent, compared with 2.42 percent for all races.

USHYEE hosts programs and mentors Hispanic youth, teaching them networking and business skills and helping them apply for college.

"[Hernandez] is not alone. Although his story is one of overcoming, it's my honor and privilege to see kids like him succeed on a regular basis," Borunda said.

Hernandez is still working toward his goal, and Borunda has become like a mentor to him. He turns to Borunda throughout the year, like when he is exhausted from staying up late studying for exams.

"He would just advise me, give me advice, saying, ‘You can do it. I know you can,'" Hernandez said. "During my freshman year in UVA, he motivated me to keep going… He's my inspiration."

USHYEE awarded Hernandez a $5,000 scholarship last year to help him with his college costs.

"Ronald is a young man who is driven, and he is overcome some challenges that just are remarkable," Borunda said.

Hernandez said many Latino youth may face similar obstacles as he did, and having a mentor or other support can make the difference between academic success and failure.

"They don't know their true potential. They don't know what they're capable of or they never tried. No one has given them a hand," he said.

Source: Gazette.net

Georgia: Hispanics Enrolled In State Colleges Spikes

June 23, 2009
Source: GPB

A report from the Southern Regional Education Board shows that the number of Hispanic students enrolled in Georgia's colleges has grown by almost 150 percent (about 7,700
students)from 1997-2007. The report released on Monday predicts the trend will continue, requiring colleges to develop programs to attract and keep the Hispanic students.

The trend is expected to accelerate as Hispanic students represent a larger portion of Georgias public high school graduates. According to the report, they were four percent of the states graduates in 2005, but are projected to be 24 percent in 2022.

Joe Marks, director of education data services for SREB, says the future for Georgia's colleges will depend on how well they respond to Hispanic students.

LiveSTRONG Launches Campaign for Hispanic Cancer Survivors

June 15, 2009

The Lance Armstrong Foundation today launched a massive 1 month multimedia Spanish campaign reaching out Spanish-Dominant Hispanic cancer survivors, their families and those who take care of them. They are using both traditional and new media to reach all generations and all walks of life. Check out LiveSTRONG’s recently updated Spanish language site @ www.LIVESTRONG.org/espanol

It is an important initiative from my fellow Austinites @ “LAF” as well as a much needed resource for Spanish-speaking Latinos who are fighting this disease. Please help spread the word to everyone you know who might benefit from it. Here is their official press release, “En Español” so you can easily pass it around; print it, email it, facebook it… whatever it takes for them to get it. It’s critical beyond doubt.

LIVESTRONG Lanza Campaña para Hispanos Sobrevivientes al Cáncer

WASHINGTON, DC (15 de junio de 2009) /PRNewswire/ — La Fundación Lance Armstrong, LAF por sus siglas en inglés, lanzó una campaña multimedia en español sin precedentes para apoyar a los sobrevivientes, familiares y a las personas encargadas del cuidado de los afectados por el cáncer entre la comunidad hispana de Estados Unidos, a través de la divulgación y promoción de recursos informativos y de orientación de alcance masivo del 15 al 31 de junio de 2009.

La campaña del programa LIVESTRONG SurvivorCare y LIVESTRONG.org/Español pone en las manos de los hispanos, la minoría más grande de Estados Unidos y la de mayor crecimiento en los últimos años, las herramientas necesarias y la información práctica para apoyar a las personas afectadas por el cáncer y también a aquellas a su alrededor, en momentos en los que la comunidad padece uno de los niveles más bajos de acceso a seguro médico de los Estados Unidos.

"Es un orgullo para mi poder servir de apoyo a la comunidad hispana de Estados Unidos, porque en la lucha contra el cáncer la unión hace la fuerza. Y estoy convencido de que juntos podemos ganar esta batalla", dijo Doug Ulman, CEO de la Fundación Lance Armstrong.

El esfuerzo inédito de LAF hacia los hispano-parlantes de Estados Unidos está apuntalado en una campaña multimedia masiva que incorpora medios tradicionales como la radio y un uso intensivo de nuevas tecnologías y redes sociales de Internet, a fin de alcanzar a hispanos de todas las generaciones, toda vez que el cáncer no discrimina.

Campaña Multimedia

A lo largo de la campaña se difundirán Anuncios de Servicio Público (PSA's) que brindarán información sobre el apoyo disponible a través de la Fundación Lance Armstrong y su programa LIVESTRONG SurvivorCare, con guías para visitar la nueva página del programa, que ha sido rediseñada para ayudar con más eficacia a la comunidad hispana, y donde sobrevivientes, familiares y personas interesadas pueden hacer consultas personalizadas.

A partir del 22 de junio, la campaña incorpora cinco programas de radio "En Vivo" en un número similar de los mercados más importantes para la comunidad hispana de Estados Unidos: Chicago (IL), San Francisco (CA), Phoenix (AZ), Denver (CO) y Washington (DC), donde especialistas en cáncer responderán de manera directa a las preguntas del público.

"Es importante recalcar, que todo aquel que requiera de nuestro apoyo, ya sea sobreviviente, familiar o persona que cuida al sobreviviente de cáncer, tiene a su alcance atención individualizada a través de LIVESTRONG SurvivorCare" agregó Ulman.

La campaña multimedia incluye además un conjunto de mensajes que por primera vez forman parte de un paquete informativo y de orientación de su clase dirigido expresamente hacia la comunidad hispana. Sus principales componentes son:

    * Una mini serie de videos en línea (webisodes) de corte testimonial que presenta algunos casos de los más usuales de sobrevivientes del cáncer y el tipo de ayuda que LAF pone a su alcance.
    * Una serie de cápsulas de audio (podcasts) que se pueden escuchar de manera instantánea o descargar a aparatos de audio portátiles a través del formato MP3 para tenerlos a disposición en cualquier momento.
    * Un dispositivo de ícono interactivo (widget) disponible para descargas al escritorio de computadoras personales para uso frecuente o para compartir con amigos en algunos de los sitios más populares de Internet como Facebook o MySpace, entre otros. El ícono tendrá información actualizada semanalmente y datos para contactar a la Fundación.
    * Un uso intensivo de las redes sociales de Internet como Twitter o YouTube para multiplicar los mensajes, a través de enlaces o páginas dedicadas para recordar a la comunidad que la ayuda está siempre al alcance de la mano con LAF.

"La comunidad hispana podrá, con todos esos recursos, conocer de primera mano información sobre el apoyo emocional y médico que requieren quienes han sido afectados por el cáncer", dijo Ulman, agregando que "estas personas recibirán el soporte para afrontar la vida después del cáncer, información sobre sus derechos como sobrevivientes, recursos para buscar tratamiento si carecen de seguro médico y asesoría sobre grupos comunitarios de apoyo para sobrevivientes".

Acerca de LAF

A través de su programa LIVESTRONG SurvivorCare www.LIVESTRONG.org/Espanol (teléfono 1866-927-7205) la Fundación ofrece consejería y referencias de programas locales, ayuda en temas financieros y de seguros, información actualizada de estudios clínicos sobre nuevos tratamientos para los diferentes tipos de cáncer, recomendaciones para hablar con los seres queridos, además de un amplio abanico de recursos para los sobrevivientes, familiares y quienes cuidan a los afectados por el cáncer.

Para más información o para obtener materiales relacionados con la campaña, comunicarse con Duly Fernandez al 202-360-4052 o duly.fernandez@hcnmedia.com

House calls by Hispanic university president

May 18, 2009
By Joe Rodriguez

David Lopez is a big man driving a huge sport utility vehicle down Story Road in East San Jose, a few blocks from National Hispanic University, where he is president and, these days, chief of student recruitment.

"Maybe I should buy a smaller car,'' he quips with a hearty laugh. "What do other university presidents drive?'' How about a tweedy, green Japanese hybrid? Lopez thought about that for only a little while.

"Nah," he declares, "I like the way this one drives!''

As in his choice of cars, Lopez doesn't think small about Latino higher education, even when the economy is rapidly tanking. In a region filled with top-notch public and private colleges, he's on a rare and special mission to grow his fledgling campus the old-fashioned way — one student at a time. With a blend of academic smarts and bilingual charm, he's seeking out promising students and their families by making highly unusual house calls.

His first stop one recent afternoon was to the home of Beatriz Ayala, an 18-year-old Mexican immigrant who picked up English and perfect grades in four short years. She's a valedictorian at Latino College Preparatory Academy, a high school on NHU's campus. Lopez doesn't want to lose the graduating senior to bigger schools that have already accepted her such as San Jose State University, and UC-Santa Barbara.

"Having her choose NHU over them would say a lot to our brightest students,'' Lopez said. "They'd see us on par with those other schools.''

Founded in 1981, the liberal arts school with an emphasis on Latino studies won full academic accreditation in 2003. I first wrote about Lopez that year, just after he left a secure job at Fresno State to come to San Jose. Since then, I've even taught a few classes at the school.

But back when he came here, it was with a lofty idea that some called impossible. He intends to turn NHU from an alternative college for bright but underachieving Latino youths into a elite institution modeled after Howard University, Spellman and Morehouse — strong historically black academic institutions. At the same time, he'd like to increase enrollment from 700 to 2,500.

Small but special

After pulling up in from of a small, ranch style house on a street crowded with cars, Lopez fiddled with his yellow tie and navy blue suit jacket just before knocking. The Ayala family greeted him with salutations in formal Spanish.

"Encantada de conocerle, Doctor Lopez,'' said Marta Ayala, the girl's mother: Enchanted to meet you.

"A su orden, Senora,'' Lopez replied: At your service.

And before too long, sitting on the sofa, Lopez was speaking to them in Spanish about the importance of parental guidance. After graduating from Rio Grande High in Albuquerque in 1970 with more basketball team letters than high grades, Lopez told his mother he was leaving for San Francisco to become a hippie.

"She asked me, Why don't you stay here and go to college?'' not yet knowing her son had missed all the application deadlines. But his mother knew somebody who knew a top administrator at New Mexico State, who invited the young man in for a chat. Lopez eventually earned his doctorate, dedicating his dissertation to the administrator.

"If he hadn't taken the time to see me personally,'' Lopez told the Ayalas, " I wouldn't be here today.'' Turning to Beatriz, Lopez pitched the advantages of small liberal arts college with a Latino spin: Small classes, more personal attention from professors and counselors, all with a vital mission: "We want to train the next generation of Latino leaders.''

Financial help

When Beatriz said she'd like to become a lawyer and earn a PhD, Lopez said NHU could easily prepare her for law school at Santa Clara University, just up the road, where he's got some academic connections.

The bright young lady perked up, but she wasn't showing her cards, not just yet.

"Doctor Lopez,'' she said in Spanish. "Having a university president visit me and my parents at home is something that isn't going to happen with the other colleges. I want to thank you for being here... But, I'm receiving financial aid offers from the other schools. Can you give me an idea what NHU could offer?''

Lopez smiled.

"I can get you that information right away.'' Back in his truck, Lopez said Beatriz would get a full scholarship, no problem, but he could not guarantee it at the time.

After San Jose State capped enrollment for this fall, Lopez practically set up recruiting offices at Evergreen Community and San Jose City College, campuses swelling with students needing to transfer.

''Where are these students going to go?'' he asks. "I'm here to offer them another option.''

Delicious brownies

Ivory Young, 29, met Lopez when the enthusiastic administrator paid a surprise visit to Young's biology classroom at Evergreen Valley College.

"I was all set on transferring to San Jose State,'' said Young to Lopez while they sat at the young man's kitchen table. "Then you came into my class and I said, "Whoa. Maybe there's something there for me.''

Young is half Mexican, half black. Around the table was his Mexican mother, Connie Young, his African-American wife, Lisa, and their four children. Lisa had baked brownies for the occasion. After downing one, Lopez made his pitch:

"There are 77 black colleges in the country,'' Lopez recites. "Together, they produce 80 percent of the African-American leadership. That's what we want to do at NHU, but we also want to recruit and educate African Americans like yourself. Did you know that black colleges in Georgia are recruiting Hispanic students? That's what we have to do more of, blacks and Latinos working together.''

Young seemed to enjoy what he was hearing. Lopez told him that Emmet D. Carson, chief of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation and Morehouse College alumnus, will deliver the keynote address at NHU's commencement in June.

"I gotta have another one of those brownies,'' Lopez says. Then he hands Young a list of courses for a bachelor's degree and teaching credential he could earn in only two years. Lopez invites Young to the campus to meet faculty and financial aid advisers.

"I don't know what to say,'' Young says with a smile. "I'll definitely drop in.'' As he leaves, Lopez bids goodbye to the Young family in English and Spanish, and steps back onto his personal the recruiting trail, this time with a bag of brownies in hand.

Source: Mercury News

University of Texas launching Hispanic Leadership Initiative

April 28, 2009
By Juan Castillo

Promoting the Hispanic population’s growing leadership and readying the next generation of leaders are among the tasks of a new Hispanic Leadership Initiative at the University of Texas.

The Center for Politics and Governance at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, together with the Texas Exes, will launch the initiative May 4 at 6 p.m. at the Etter-Harbin Alumni Center Connally Ballroom.

The event will feature remarks by University Texas System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa, followed by a panel discussion featuring former U.S. congressman Henry Bonilla, former Texas Solicitor General Ted Cruz, Texas State Rep. Pete Gallego and Travis County District Judge Orlinda Naranjo.

Center for Politics and Governance director Veronica Vargas Stidvent noted that Texas is rapidly moving toward being majority Hispanic. With the center’s home at the flagship university of a state that has produced three of the past nine presidents and a disproportionate number of congressional leaders, she said the center “is uniquely positioned to have a practical effect on the role of Hispanic Americans in the political institutions of our state and nation.”

The launch event is open to the public.

According to the Center for Politics and Governance, the Hispanic Leadership Initiative has five main objectives to be achieved over a three-year period:

* Highlight Hispanic leadership and the emerging role of Hispanic Americans in influencing public policy
* Recognize outstanding achievements in leadership by Hispanic alumni
* Provide mentoring and networking opportunities for Hispanic alumni and students
* Introduce Hispanic undergraduate students to the LBJ School of Public Affairs
* Reconnect Hispanic alumni with the University of Texas on an annual basis

Source: Austin American-Statesman

Black and Latino boys predominate in emotional support classes

Winter 2008 Edition
by Sylvia Morse

African American boys make up 59 percent of students enrolled in “emotional support” programs in Philadelphia but less than a third of the general student population. They are six times more likely to be labeled emotionally disturbed than White girls.

White girls are four times more likely than Black boys to be identified as mentally gifted.

Highlighting similar statistics in her incoming convocation speech in August, Superintendent Arlene Ackerman said, “The research clearly shows us that for young men of color, particularly African American and Latino … a special education label, especially ‘emotionally disturbed,’ becomes a life sentence, causing many … to drop out of school early and enter the criminal justice system.”

Overrepresentation of students of color in special education is a reality nationwide. Many say racial biases among those who refer and evaluate students for special education are a factor.

“When a child of color is bored and they act out, [school authorities] assume it’s a behavioral problem,” says Cecilia Thompson, chairperson of the Right to Education Task Force of Philadelphia. “I believe [the student] could be mentally gifted, but the mindset is on emotional support.”

The tendency to identify disruptive behavior as a sign of more severe disability may result from cultural gaps between teachers and students. White teachers in urban school districts unfamiliar with the language and survival strategies many students acquire outside of school are more likely to make inappropriate referrals, research suggests.

Studies indicate the risk of students being identified with a disability varies by race, even controlling for the effects of class.

Disproportions are most pronounced in the high-incidence or “judgmental” categories: emotionally disturbed, learning disabled, and mildly mentally retarded, which require less medical or psychological professional oversight.

But poverty also contributes to the likelihood of disability. “It’s a multifaceted thing,” says Len Rieser, co-director of the Education Law Center. “There can’t be a single ‘why.’”

The national Civil Rights Project concluded in a 2002 report that unconscious racial discrimination by school authorities, resource inequities, biased methods of evaluation, pressures of high-stakes testing on teachers, and the dynamic between parents of color and school administrators all contribute to ethnic and gender disparities in special education.

An example illustrates how the inequalities associated with poverty can contribute to faulty decisions by individuals and lead to disproportions. A teacher in a stressed, high-poverty school may have more students who need extra attention but fewer resources outside of special education. Special education is then seen as the only supportive environment, and teachers are more likely to make referrals.

A District official observed that often it is the parents who want an evaluation. “We’re still in the mindset that there’s something special about special education,” says Linda Williams, administrator for the District’s Office of Specialized Services (OSS), “that it’s a place and not a service.”

To address overrepresentation, the District has introduced professional development for school psychologists that will “build their skills, especially around areas of culture,” Williams says.

The District is also promoting inclusion and a coteaching model, which integrates students with and without special needs in one classroom led by both a grade teacher and a special education teacher.

Decatur Elementary in the Northeast is “a model school for inclusion practices,” Williams says. The school’s principal, Charles Connor, believes the number of referrals went down when special education was no longer a separate, restricted environment. Because general education teachers remain responsible for the students they refer, Connor says, special education is no longer a way to unload difficult-to-teach students.

Local advocates believe most parents don’t understand that overrepresentation of children of color in special education is a systemwide problem. If they did, parents might be able to make better decisions for their own children.

“It’s the ‘Why me?’ syndrome,” Thompson says. “[Parents] think it’s just them.”

And they don’t always exercise their rights in the process. “They think the psychological evaluation is the beall end-all,” Thompson says. But she adds that parents’ role can be crucial in combating misguided placements if they have the right information.

Source: The Notebook

Latinos now largest percentage of Boston students

April 19, 2009
Via The Associated Press

The racial balance in Massachusetts' largest school district has shifted, with Latinos now accounting for Boston's largest percentage of students.

Black students previously comprised the largest population segment of the schools, which have about 55,800 children in kindergarten through 12th grade.

This year's annual student count shows Latinos accounted for 38.1% of all students while blacks comprised 37.9%. The change follows decades of steady growth among children of Hispanic backgrounds and declines in the percentage of black children in the district.

The changing face of the city's schools reflects a surging immigrant population across Massachusetts.

Boston school district figures show about 13% of students are Caucasian, about 9% are Asian and the rest are multi-racial or other ethnicities.

Source: WTEN

Hispanics travel rough road to higher education

April 5, 2009
By JEANNIE KEVER

The future of Texas is sitting in room 318 at Austin High School, and right now, it could go either way.

Students in the after-school program — Hispanic and from low-income families, the group least likely to enroll in college — are optimistic.

But who knows?

“I hope to go,” says Neri Gamez, 17, a high school junior who dreams of being a doctor.

Gamez has an advantage: She is in a program run by the Center for Mexican-American Studies at the University of Houston, designed to help Hispanic students enter college and, once there, earn a degree. Academic Achievers is among dozens of programs that address one of the state’s most intractable education problems.

But Hispanics, the state’s fastest-growing ethnic group, have fallen behind in some key areas, and efforts to change that remain piecemeal:

• Statewide, 68 percent of Hispanics graduate from high school within four years, 10 points below the overall rate.

• Just 42.5 percent of Hispanics who graduated from high school in 2007 enrolled in college or a technical training program the following fall, compared with 45.3 percent of black students and 57.5 percent of white students.

• Texas is “well below target” in raising the number of Hispanics in college, according to a 2008 report by the Higher Education Coordinating Board. Enrollment of both white and black students was “somewhat above target.”

And there are no consequences for schools that don’t raise Hispanic enrollment.

“The good news is, there’s a state goal,” said Paul Ruiz, co-founder and senior advisor to the Education Trust, a national group that advocates for at-risk students. “The bad news is, the institutions don’t get it. They set goals for Latino kids at about half the rate the state says we need.”

The issue is complicated by the rapid growth of the Hispanic population; about 36 percent of the Texas population is Hispanic.

“We’ve made progress,” said Raymund Paredes, higher education commissioner for Texas. “Our challenge is, we started so far behind, and the Latino population is growing so fast.”

Unless the numbers change, the state will be unable to field a well-educated work force. “The Hispanic community is key to the economic future of Texas,” Paredes said.
Enrollment edging up

The state plan, known as Closing the Gaps, began in 2000 with the goal of increasing college enrollment to 5.7 percent of the population by 2015. That would raise college-going rates to the national average.

Over the past eight years, overall enrollment has edged up to 5.3 percent from 5 percent. For Hispanics, it’s up to 3.9 percent from 3.7 percent.

More than 1.2 million Texans enrolled in a two- or four-year college or technical school last fall; state goals call for that to reach 1.6 million by 2015. The Coordinating Board’s own estimates suggest it will fall short by 300,000 students.

Gamez, a student at Austin High School, said she understands why so many of her peers don’t go on to college. “They may have to work,” she said. “And once they get a taste of the money, they may decide to skip college.”

Often, no one in their family has attended college, so they don’t know the ropes.

Gamez lives with her mother and 19-year-old brother, both of whom work at a tire store. Her father graduated from college in Mexico and owned a tire shop in Houston but now is in prison, she said. “He didn’t really get to apply his skills.”

She intends to be different.
Patchwork efforts

Paredes and other higher education officials point to the successes.

Hispanic enrollment has grown faster than that of other racial or ethnic groups, and is up 50 percent over the past five years. Two-thirds of the growth was at community or technical colleges, rather than a four-year school.

But the population has grown almost as quickly, wiping out much of the gains.

Paredes notes that improving college-going rates has to start in high school or even sooner, and he has pushed for more stringent high school graduation requirements to better prepare students for college. Those took effect in 2008.

The state has established counseling centers in 250 Texas middle and high schools to improve college counseling. Paredes also has argued, with mixed success, for more financial aid.

“Most Latino students come from poor families, and they’ll need aid to go to college,” he said.

Success is relative.

The University of Texas system touts its diversity, noting that in 2008, Hispanic enrollment was about equal to that of white students, and several campuses have been designated as among the nation’s top in awarding degrees to Hispanics. But most Hispanic enrollment is concentrated at the system’s border schools, including UT-Pan American (86 percent), UT-Brownsville (91 percent) and UT-El Paso (75 percent).

At UT-Austin, 16 percent of students are Hispanic; at UT-Dallas, it’s 9 percent.

The flagship campus could do better, Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa acknowledged. “It does require a real outreach effort,” he said. “It doesn’t happen automatically.”

Which is precisely Ruiz’s point.

Ruiz, who lives in San Antonio, suggests the state should set goals for each institution, with top administrators held accountable for meeting them.

Janet Beinke, director of planning at the coordinating board, said it’s not so easy to impose mandates. “What are you going to do? Take the money away?” she asked. “You have to use carrots.”

But Ruiz disagrees.

“To close the Hispanic gap, institutions have to do things dramatically differently,” he said.

Most rely upon a patchwork of efforts.

The University of Houston, for example, sends recruiters to local high schools and college fairs, said Jeff Fuller, director of student recruitment. Its major outreach comes through the Center for Mexican-American Studies, which began its first program at Jackson Middle School more than 20 years ago.

Progress has been slow.
Multiple stumbling blocks

About 20 percent of UH students are Hispanic, up only slightly over the last five years. (About 40 percent of Harris County residents are Hispanic.) But that was still enough to earn a place among the top 20 colleges and universities awarding degrees to Hispanic students, according to The Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education magazine.

The numbers are slightly higher at the University of Houston-Downtown, which has its own outreach programs. About 36 percent of students there are Hispanic.

Rebeca Trevino, who manages the Center for Mexican-American Studies’ Academic Achievers program, said several factors hold Hispanic students back, including money and a lack of role models.

Language, high school preparation and immigration issues all can be stumbling blocks, as well.

“Most of our students are the first in their family to go to college,” Trevino said. “They need people they can relate to.”
A new tradition

Irene Avellaneda, 18, found that in her brother, Hector.

But when Hector Avella­neda, now 22, walked onto the Texas A&M campus in 2004, he had to forge his own path.

The eldest of three children, he was the first in his family to finish high school. College was foreign territory.

“The first semester and first year were kind of rough,” he said.

His GPA dipped to 2.75 that first semester — not terrible, but below the 3.0 his scholarships required — and he was placed on probation.

But he turned that around and will graduate in May, just as Irene finishes her first year at UH-Downtown.

“Hector was a big inspiration,” his sister said. “The younger siblings are always going to look up to the older.”

That now goes double for their youngest sibling, 14-year-old Moses.

Source: Houston Chronicle

Sharp Growth in Suburban Minority Enrollment Yields Modest Gains in School Diversity

March 31, 2009
by Richard Fry

The student population of America's suburban public schools has shot up by 3.4 million in the past decade and a half, and virtually all of this increase (99%) has been due to the enrollment of new Latino, black and Asian students, according to an analysis of public school data by the Pew Hispanic Center, a project of the Pew Research Center. Once a largely white enclave, suburban school districts in 2006-07 educated a student population that was 41.4% non-white, up from 28% in 1993-94 and not much different from the 43.7% non-white share of the nation's overall public school student population. At the same time, suburban school districts have been gaining "market share"; they educated 38% of the nation's public school students in 2006-07, up from 35% in 1993-94.

Despite the sharp rise in the racial and ethnic diversity of suburban district enrollments overall, there has been only a modest increase in the racial and ethnic diversity of student populations at the level of the individual suburban school.  For example, in 2006-07, the typical white suburban student attended a school whose student body was 75% white; in 1993-94, this same figure had been 83%. So at a time when the white share of student enrollment in suburban school districts was falling by 13 percentage points (from 72% in 1993-94 to 59% in 2006-07), the exposure of the typical white suburban student to minority students in his or her own school was growing by a little more than half that much-or 8 percentage points.

When it comes to increases in public school student enrollment, the suburbs are where most of the action has been over the past decade and a half. In 1993-94, city school districts educated a majority of the nation's minority students. That is no longer the case. The movement out of city schools has nearly exclusively been suburban school districts' gain.

The movement of minority students into suburban schools has had the overall effect of slightly reducing levels of ethnic and racial segregation throughout the nation's 93,430 public schools.  Minority students on average are less segregated in suburban school districts compared with city school districts, so the shift toward suburban school districts tends to reduce national segregation levels.

The report also examines the changes since 1993-94 in individual suburban school districts.  It lists the suburban school districts that have had the fastest growth in minority enrollment, as well as those with the highest levels of racial/ethnic segregation.

These findings are based on an analysis of the most recent available enrollment figures for the nation's public schools. The National Center for Education Statistics of the U.S. Department of Education collects this information and also classifies school districts as being suburban, city or town/rural districts.

Visit PewHispanic.org to download the full report.

Source: Pew Hispanic Center