Work needed to bridge Latino higher-education gap

Despite inroads in Latino college completion, the recently released Excelencia in Education “Latino College Completion in 50 States” report reveals there is much work still needed to bridge the higher-education gap.

Specifically, the fact sheets from 2010-2011 – released as 53 separate sheets updating the current status of college completion among Latinos nationally, in each state and in the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico – show as a whole the gap in degree attainment between Latino and white, non-Hispanic cohorts of first-time, full-time students was about 9 percent.  

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“This important and painstaking research from Excelencia in Education on Latino college completion tells us not only where we are in each state, but provides examples of successful programs to move us in a positive direction,” said Rep. Raúl Grijalva (Arizona), Chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Education Task Force.

“Such concise and actionable research is invaluable to policymakers and education leaders at all levels.”

 What Excelencia in Education’s research shows

• Compared to state and national populations, Hispanics continue to be much younger, with the median age for Latinos being 27 compared to a median age for White, non-Hispanics at 42.

• Compared to state and national populations, Latinos are a larger share of the K-12 public school population, representing 22 percent of students and 17 percent of the U.S. population.

• The gap of education attainment continues to be a major problem for Hispanics. Latino adults have lower degree attainment levels than other groups with 20 percent of adults having a postsecondary degree compared to 36 percent of all American adults.

Deborah A. Santiago, Excelencia in Education COO & Vice President for Policy,  spoke with Voxxi about the information she refers to as “state snapshots”. She considers it to be important because she believes too often conversations about Hispanics – if they’re had at all – are very deficient-oriented.

 “We want to have the conversation to start with completion and then back map to what we need to do to get students and our community there,” said Santiago.

“We have found a lot of ignorant people who don’t know or don’t think about looking at subgroups of our population to see if there is success or progress,” she added.