For other immigrant groups, America has been a land of opportunity, with each successive generation climbing higher on the educational ladder. For many Hispanics, it’s just the opposite. In one of the two recent studies conducted at the University of Texas at Austin, Frank D. Bean and Jorge Chapa found that the longer Mexican-American families are in the United States, the lower their children’s educational level will sink. There are differences among various Hispanic as a group are now nearly three times more likely to drop out of school than either blacks or whites: by the age of 17, almost one in five Hispanics has dropped out, compared with roughly one in 16 blacks and one in 15 whites. In a report last year, the National Council of La Raza, a Washington-based public-policy group, declared that Hispanics “are the least educated major population in the United States.” By the year 2000, Hispanics will account for 10 percent of the nation’s labor force.
Researchers are trying to find out why so many Hispanic youngsters leave school. Since 1988, Toni Falbo of UT at Austin and Harriett Romo of Southwest Texas State University have been tracking 100 Mexican-American teenagers (among them the 18-year-old mentioned above). All the youngsters were labeled “high risk” by their school district. As of last June, 40 percent had dropped out; Falbo predicts that an additional 20 percent will have quit by the time school starts next month.
For most Mexican-American and other Hispanics, poverty is the single greatest obstacle to schoolwork. “Kids are dealing with severe social and economic problems that take their minds off school,” Romo says. Teens drop out and go to work to put food on the family table. “Many students have conflicting roles,” says Denise De La Rosa, a senior education policy analyst with La Raza. “They are trying to be students, but often they have to work to help their parents out.”
Richard Farias, executive director of the Houston-based Association for the Advancement of Mexican-Americans, says that too often, teachers and counselors encourage Hispanics and other minority kids to find jobs or go to vocational school when they fall behind. Says Farias: I’ve had more than one kid say that they’ve been told by teachers, “You’re not going to make it. You might as well drop out.'”
No one knows exactly why Hispanics aren’t more upwardly mobile, but Bean speculates that first generation parents are often the most highly motivated because they made the choice to leave their homeland. They push themselves and their children to do well, Bean says. The second generation, though often better educated than the first, loses that drive after getting stuck on welfare or in low-paying jobs. They are more likely to push their own children as hard.
To combat the discouraging trend, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus last month introduced legislation that would, among other things, establish early-intervention programs for elementary-school students and grant scholarships to college students who would teach in disadvantaged areas. In addition, a number of alternative high schools have been established for students in predominantly Hispanic communities. In Houston, for example, the private George I. Sanchez High School boasts a graduation rate of 95 percent of the senior class. The key, says principal Mark Gilbert-Cougar, is that in addition to a standard curriculum, the school provides social services that deal with unstable homes, drug and alcohol abuse, and teen parenthood.
The formula works for teens like Denise Ayala, 17, who dropped out when she got pregnant in the seventh grade. Now the mother of three children under 4 years old, Denise came to Sanchez when the school helped her get day care. There was lots of one-on-one counseling, she says, and after a while, Sanchez began to feel like “family.” When Denise talks about school, she speaks with the fervor of a convert. “I need to better my life,” she says. “I need to provide for my children and myself. The only way I can do that is by getting an education.” She’s well on her way after graduating this June. Her next stop: the University of Houston.
Hispanics enter school later and leave school earlier. They’re less likely to attend nursery school or kindergarten and more likely to drop out by the age of 17.
At each grade level a larger percentage of Hispanic children than white or black children are enrolled below grade level.
Hispanics have the highest school dropout rates of any major nationality or ethnic group-about 43%.
Among Hispanics 25 and older, only 9.9% have completed college, compared with 21.9% of other Americans.
SOURCE: National Council of La Raza; Current Population Surveys
