subject: Hispanic Education Gap is Narrowing [print this page] Hispanic Education Gap is Narrowing Hispanic Education Gap is Narrowing
The release of a new study which details the narrowing of educational achievement gaps amongst Hispanic students coincides with the recently held Presidential summit on Hispanic Education Achievement. The study, released a day after President Obama signed an executive order to improve the education of Hispanic Americans, shows that the Hispanic education gap is, slowly but surely, beginning to even out.
The White House initiative, first implemented by President George H.W. Bush in 1990 and continued by each president after, "is intended to address the so-called achievement gap, the fact that some ethnic groups lag behind others in graduating from high school and college." And, with only 13% of Latinos holding a bachelor's degree compared with 21% of African Americans and 39% of whites, there has been an obvious reason for concern.
However, the most recent study shows that at least one school is proactively doing its part. Western Oregon University recently reached a "49% graduation rate for its Hispanic students," and is just one example of a school that's working towards closing the educational achievement gap.
In the study published by the Education Trust, a non-profit education group that works to promote student achievement, the difference between schools that successfully graduated large groups of Latinos and those that didn't was found, largely, to be based on school leadership. The study also found that schools who don't invest solely on minority enrollment but focus more on minority students' successful completion of degree programs, are having the highest success rates.
Western Oregon University, the school cited in the study, heeded the president's call to graduate more students, especially Latino students. Because of administrative steps taken by the school, Western Oregon University was able to jump from a 36% Latino graduation rate in 2002 to its current 49%.
There were three major initiatives the university employed to reach out to its Latino students and to eventually reach these statistics. The university pinpointed the Hispanic students "weaknesses and needs" in order to strengthen their advising system. Then, administrators looked at affordability issues. Because many of the minority students like the Hispanic American students were low-income, the administration decided to guarantee that their tuition would not increase in the four years it would take to earn a degree. Lastly, they changed their school policies to be less about access and more about success and graduation.
By implementing these three initiatives, Western Oregon University improved its Hispanic American graduation rate by 13% in just 6 years. Western Oregon University is one of many ground schools trying to help improve Hispanic American graduation rates.Online schools are also popular among minority students who want to earn a degree and minority students have traditionally been well represented in online colleges and universities. Jennifer Engle, one of the authors of the study, noted that by placing an emphasis more on graduation than retention and ensuring that all students get increased access to services like advising, Hispanic students (at online or ground schools) are able to graduate at a much higher rate.
