One More Reason to Love NPR

Here's why: they have some smart talk about Latino kids.

Pedro Noguera, venerated and visionary teacher and professor of education at NYU, and Jeffery Passel of the Pew Hispanic Center discuss myths about Latino kids.

1 in 4 children under 5 is now Latino, so this has proven itself to be an increasingly relevant topic as the population grows. Noguera, in particular, offers some strong commentary when talking about the opportunity gap. He notes that Latino students have fewer opportunities to attend well-funded schools and that they are more likely to attend under-resourced schools - which seriously diminishes the likelihood of them attaining an excellent education. Right on. And let's change that, by the way.

Want to listen? Here you go.

More on Cool V. School

Mr. AB of From the TFA Trenches comments on the San Jose Mercury News article that I wrote about last week. The best part is this:

"Get this straight and send it to your friends: Children of color don’t devalue a good education and therefore fail to get it, they’re never given it and eventually, sensibly, stop caring.

By the time San Jose’s Latino population gets to high school, they will have endured nine years of being told they are failures, of listening to the devaluation of their home language, of watching all fun be stripped from their education, and of receiving sub-par instruction from inadequate teachers. It is a testament to the triumph of the human spirit that any child of color graduates from a high-challenge school at all."

Check out his entire post here. And thanks to dy/dan for the tip-off.

Latinos: Can You "Behave" in School?

I feel like I've spent much of this week ranting about racism in education, but here's another great example (unfortunately): Fairfax County Virginia's "Behavior Study," which ruled that Black and Hispanic kids behave worse and have worse "moral character" than White and Asian students. 

Some brave School Board members are protesting the "study," which was conducted by surveying teachers and asking them to judge the moral character of their students. The results were disaggregated by race and then presented as a staff report. 

For the past few decades, educators have worked to convince the public that all children - regardless of their race or economic background - can learn. And now, they're recanting that statement. Talk about a step backwards. 

Update: The Fairfax County School Board has decided to suspend voting on the report. 

The Dropout Crisis: Not a Problem After All

So, maybe this whole dropout thing isn't as terrible as we thought. 

Or so says Steve Blow in his Dallas Morning News article, published yesterday. 

"Here's my guess," he writes, "Most kids who drop out manage to become productive citizens anyway." Later in the article, Blow declares, "Look around. Lots and lots of jobs require only a basic academic education. Let's tailor some schools to match those students and those jobs." 

He's right - there are a lot of jobs that require only a basic education. But are those the jobs that provide livable salaries, that come with health care benefits, that include a 401k plan? 

Most likely not. 

The point of education - which Blow misses - is to give our children options for the future. We must prepare them for any career path that they choose. Students should be equally prepared to choose to become auto mechanics as they would be to become pre-med students. There is nothing wrong with having a job that doesn't require a lot of education, but children must be able to opt out of these jobs and not be forced into them. 

I'm pretty sure that Blow has never heard the phrase, "the soft racism of low expectations." Unfortunately, that is just what he is promoting. 

Hispanic High School Grads Are On the Rise

By Guestblogger Rena Mathena

The West Interstate Commission for Higher Education has just released its 7th edition of their report, Knocking at the College Door: Projections of High School Graduates by State and Race/Ethnicity, 1992-2022, which has some shocking and exciting numbers for the Hispanic high school population across the country.

Out of all high school students, Latinos are the ones who will see the largest increase in their graduation rate from 2004-2005 to 2021-2022. In states where there is a large Latino population, like Arizona, Colorado, and Florida, the increase is an exciting surprise, since all three states are looking at more than a 60% jump, with Arizona expecting a 102.6% swell in graduates. The increase of Hispanic graduates is going to be an excellent contributor to the overall increase of the national graduation rate.

Even in states with smaller Latino populations, like Tennessee, Nevada, and Utah, the projected growth of Hispanic high school students and graduates will give their parents a powerful influence in the education systems of their state. With more Latino students and parents becoming part of the school system, their voice for change and choice will be louder and could help bring about more educational reforms in states where that had never been a big possibility.

Some of the most impressive expected growths, like Nevada’s 228.7% increase of Hispanic graduates and Tennessee’s +400% projected increase, will be a big bright sign to state educators and officials. Parents are going to be looking at their schools and wanting the best choices to assure their children will be a part of this rising achievement trend.

Young Latino Voters Charge Polls and I Philosophize

This is good news for the Latino community. The more voters, the better, and having politically engaged young people will be key to the future well-being of Hispanics in the U.S.

But simply having voters is not enough. It is essential to have educated voters - voters who can think for themselves, reason for themselves, and independently decide how they should vote. This is where our country's educational system steps in, as it was founded to ensure that every child in America would have the skills necessary to be this sort of educated voter and participate in the democratic system. Although today, we often consider education an end in itself, in truth, it is the means to an end - that end being a functional democracy.

So, when 47% of Latino children are dropping out of high school before graduation, we can ask, is our school system accomplishing its ultimate goal? Is it creating young adults who have the literacy and critical thinking skills necessary to be productive citizens? Is it creating young adults who are educated voters?

The answer: a resounding no.

Retrospective: Latino Students After Seven Years of NCLB

Elena Rocha at the Center for American Progress has a new article up: "NCLB and Latinos: No Latino Child Left Behind Matters." She does a good job profiling the Latino education crisis AND speaking on the positive gains that Latino students have made under the accountability-focused NCLB.

And then there's this:

Failure to take immediate action to improve public schooling for Latinos will be detrimental. There isn’t much time to reverse course. Latinos are and will continue to be a significant force in every aspect of American life. Admittedly, constructing a 21st century education system that properly supports Latinos and other minorities, poor children, English language learners, and children with disabilities will require greater commitment and financial investments from federal, state, and local leaders. But continuing on the existing path is not an option.

I don't take issue with her assertion that public schooling for Latinos must improve - it's true, it must. But I have to disagree that "greater commitment and financial investments from federal, state, and local leaders" is going to be the key to improving those public schools. More money does not equal a better education; take DC, for example, which consistently ranks among the lowest in the country on student achievement, yet spends over $13,000 per pupil.

Years of pouring money into our school system has not solved the Latino education crisis - 42% of Latino students still drop out of high school before graduation.

Therefore, I ask: do you want a system that supports all kinds of learners? Where students attend schools that serve their individual educational needs? Where Latino students are consistently successful, because they are learning in a way that suits them?

Give families a choice. Give them school choice.

And best of all: it won't cost us millions of dollars.

Are Latinos Disenchanted with GOP Policy?

By Guestblogger Rena Mathena

This past Wednesday, the Colorado Confidential posted this article, “State of U.S. Latinos has Suffered in Bush-led Union, Hispanic Leaders Say,” by Kate Bernuth, explaining the loss of Latino support during President Bush’s second term after noticing that nothing was much better than it had been in 2004, when Bush had 40% of the Hispanic vote, a record number for a GOP candidate.

After all the promises made by Bush during his first term that have yet to be completely accomplished, like reforming the immigration system, providing health care for uninsured Hispanic workers, and improving education opportunities for minorities and low-income families, it’s no wonder why the Republican National Hispanic Assembly of Colorado is saying that the GOP will struggle to get a high percentage of the Hispanic vote. After listening to his last State of the Union address on Jan. 28, Bush did not seem to be advocating for his Hispanic voters and he hardly mentioned the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2001, which he began to improve K-12 public education, especially for minority and low-income students. It almost seemed like he had given up, making it hard for most Latino voters to continue to support the GOP or to have believe that NCLB will continue and improve public education. The one vague promise is his proposed "Pell Grants for Kids" program, which has potential, but also needs to be further "fleshed out" before we can put much faith in it.

Looking at the statistics from 2004, 24% of Latino 16- to 24-year-olds dropped out of high school and only 25% of those who did graduate went directly to college. In 2006, 22.4% of Latino students dropped out of high school, and of those who did graduate, only 30.3% went directly to college. Not much of a difference when looking back on the grand promises of NCLB, implemented by Bush to repair the educational crisis.

Well, this is not the first time..

that you've heard it, but School Reform News is reporting that "School Choice Could Help Slow Latino Dropout Rate."

Interestingly, the article includes some comments on the difference in dropout rates between Latino immigrants and American-born Latinos. For obvious reasons, Latino immigrants drop out of school at a much higher rate, but as of yet, there is little research to indicate exactly how educators can reach out to these students and prevent them from leaving school. As the Latino immigrant population grows and moves to new areas, however, this will surely because a necessity for school systems that want to graduate their Latino youth.

Educational Robin Hood: Sneaking into Out-of-District Schools

Today's blog post is authored by an Hispanic CREO intern, Moira Nadal. For comments or questions, she can be reached at mnadal@brynmawr.edu.

An article in the New York Times reveals a crisis currently faced by many suburban school districts: students claiming false residence to sneak into out-of-district schools. It describes the experience of one school in New Jersey trying to deal with this problem and the drastic measures administrators have turned to in order to cope. To combat this major problem, for example, school districts are hiring investigators and retired policemen, creating anonymous hotlines and posting bounties for reports of out-of-district students that are proven to be true.

The lack of educational opportunities that creates this phenomenon is a problem for students across the US. Several sources in the article are quoted as saying that students’ sneaking in is a persistent problem in their districts. This is clearly a manifestation of parents' need to have more and better options for schooling their children. In several parents’ and community blogs across the nation, parents admit to sending their children to out-of-district schools and give many reasons why they choose to do so. For many parents in the Berkeley area, for example, the issue of convenience came up for working parents who want their child’s school to be closer to their place of work. In Georgia’s Henry County, many seem to believe that a search for better facilities is leading students to sneak in from neighboring counties.

Other forums mention students who want to switch to another school because of smaller classes, better teachers, and safer learning environments. These reasons for transferring are particularly relevant to Latino students, who are disproportionately enrolled in failing or persistently dangerous schools. For many low-income Hispanics, especially those who are denied school choice and lack the resources to pay for private school, transferring to an out-of-district school - or sneaking in - may be the only viable opportunity for a decent education.

There are still many parents who wish that their child’s school were more convenient, to their work or to a caregiver. There are parents frustrated by the lack of qualified teachers and learning materials, overcrowding, and violence; who wish for their children to be able to go to schools with more competitive sports teams or with specialized language classes. There are many reasons that students are sneaking illegally into other school districts - these reasons are the same why parents deserve to be given more power over their children’s school choices.

Sound Bites: The Univision Republican Debate

The first Spanish-language Republican debate was hosted on Univision last night. This was an opportunity for GOP candidates to win back the Hispanic vote, which, as I noted last week, has declined significantly.

The questions ranged from immigration to making English THE official language of the US, but here are some quick bites from the candidates on education:

Question: How do you explain the decline of support to Republicans by Hispanics?

Mike Huckabee: I think Hispanics want the same thing everybody wants. They want jobs. They want education.... If we're really serious about truly saying we want more than 30 percent of the vote, then as we look at issues like education we'll understand that while the dropout rate from high school is 30 percent among all populations, it's 50 percent among Hispanics. We've got to change that by creating personalized education that focuses on perpetuating what's good for students, not just making what's good for the school.

***

Question: Do you think that you're taking a risk to come here and lose support from the more conservative base of your party?

Rudolph Giuliani: Don't see any risk at all in coming before a Hispanic audience. Hispanic Americans are Americans, just as much as all other Americans. They have the same values, the same interests.... Hispanics have a tremendous interest in giving more freedom back to people, giving more people -- giving people more of a chance to decide on the education of their child. That's why I think school choice would be a very good thing to do for Hispanics, for Hispanic parents, for all parents. The decision on where the child goes to school should primarily be made by the parent, and the parent should decide what school the child goes to, not the government bureaucrat.

That's one of many, many things that really unites what Hispanics want and need and what all parents want and need, which is more control over their child's education. And that's something that I would fight very hard to bring about.

***

Question: A recent survey done for La Raza National Council show that nine out of 10 Hispanic voters think that improved public education should be a priority for the next president of the United States. Let's start with Senator Thompson. What should we do to improve the public schools so our children will be educated in this country from coast to coast?

Fred Thompson: First of all, I think we need to recognize where the responsibility lies. It would be easy enough for someone running for president to say: I have a several-point plan to fix our education problem. It's not going to happen. And it shouldn't happen from the Oval Office.

We spend about 9 percent of education dollars now at the federal level. The responsibility historically and properly is at the state and local level. I think, however, we can do things that would support choice, do things that would support vouchers, do things that would support homeschooling, and recognize that we need to speak the truth.

One of the advantages of being in the Oval Office is having a bully pulpit. And the fact of the matter is, if families would stay together, if fathers would raise their children, especially young men when they get into troublesome ages, we would solve a good part of the education problem in this country.

John McCain: Choice and competition is the key to success in education in America. That means charter schools, that means home schooling, it means vouchers, it means rewarding good teachers and finding bad teachers another line of work. It means... rewarding good performing schools, and it really means in some cases putting bad performing schools out of business.... I want every American parent to have a choice, a choice as to how they want their child educated, and I guarantee you the competition will dramatically increase the level of education in America.

Mitt Romney: Well, we've got a pretty good model. If you look at my state, even before I got there, other governors and legislatures worked real hard to improve education. And they did a number of things that made a big difference. One is, they started testing our kids to see who was succeeding, making sure that failing schools were identified and then turning them around. They fought for school choice. When I became governor, I had to protect school choice because the legislature tried to stop it.

And then we also fought for English immersion. We wanted our kids coming to school to learn English from the very beginning. And then we did something that was really extraordinary. We said to every kid that does well on these exams that we put in place before you can graduate from high school, we're going to give you a John and Abigail Adams scholarship, four years tuition-free to our state university or state colleges for all the kids that graduate in the top quarter of their class.

We care about the quality of education. I want to pay better teachers more money. Teachers are underpaid, but I want to evaluate our teachers and see which ones are the best and which ones are not.... These principles of choice, parental involvement, encouraging high standards, scholarships for our best kids -- these turn our schools into the kind of magnets that they can be for the entire nation.

***

Question: We're going to continue talking about education. One our of three Hispanic students don't finish high school. What would you do to stop dropouts of school?

Mike Huckabee: An education is empowerment. The lack of it leads us to incredible, just all kinds of obstacles in our path.... And we always talk about we need more math and science, and we, and we're doing a better job. But one of the reasons we have kids failing is not because they're dumb, it's they're bored. They're bored with a curriculum that doesn't touch them.

We have schools that are about perpetuating the schools, not helping the students. I propose launching weapons of mass instruction, making sure that we are launching not only the math and science... but music and art programs that touch the right side of the brain, and not only educate the left side of the student's brain.

Because without a creative economy and a creative student, you have a bored student, and that's one of the reasons we see so many of them dropping out.

Rudy Giuliani: Well, you know, Governor Huckabee reminds me of the fact that I'm the product of a Catholic school from the day I started in kindergarten until the day I got out of college....It was my parents' choice. They made that choice for me. I wouldn't have known. They made that choice. It was hard for them to afford it. I was fortunate enough to get scholarships along the way to help.

But the reality is, that's really the answer. And we're all saying it in a different way. We can revolutionize public education in this country by allowing for choice.

Has it ever occurred to you that we have the best higher education system in the world, and we have a weakening K-12, including for Hispanic students? Now, why do we have the best higher education in the world and this K-12 that's under great stress?

Because higher education is based on choice. It's based on you pick a college because you want to go there. The government doesn't force you to go there. We should allow parents, like my parents were able to do; we should empower them by giving them the money, giving them scholarships, giving them vouchers, let them choose a public school, a private school, a parochial school, a charter school, homeschooling. Let's give the power to the parents, rather than to the government bureaucrats. And we will turn around education within three years.

Duncan Hunter:...What we have to do in this country is to take away all this old credentialing. We've got to bring in aerospace engineers and pilots and mathematicians and scientists and business-people, and we have to bring in people who can inspire kids at a young age to reach for the stars, and then convince them to work hard enough to get there.

Inspiration, that's how we increase our capability in education.

The debate's transcript can be found in its entirety here.

Business Leaders Unite to Solve Latino Education Crisis in Utah

Official report:

In Salt Lake City this morning, several business leaders joined with Competitive America to pledge their support in solving the Latino education crisis in Utah. Latinos, who comprise 12% of Utah’s population, drop out of high school at astounding rates – approximately 40 to 50 percent each year.

“This is a state crisis, which is why these Latino business leaders are coming together. Ask any business leader and they’ll tell you the negative impact an uneducated workforce has on their company,” said Julio Fuentes, vice president of Competitive America. “Failing so many Latino students by not getting them the education they need will be a drain on the state’s economy for decades to come.”

Despite the fact that college degrees have become increasingly necessary in the labor market, only about 12% of Latinos nationwide actually hold a degree in higher education. Competitive America is a national coalition of business leaders concerned about this crisis and its future effects on the workforce and the American economy.

In addition to Fuentes, other participants in the press conference included: Tony Yapias, former director of the state office of Hispanic affairs and a public school parent, Marco Diaz, former chairman of the Utah Republican National Hispanic Assembly and newly-elected vice chairman of the National Republican Hispanic Assembly, Antonella Packard, president of the Latin American Chamber of Commerce, Quiko Cornejo, founder of the Utah Minority Community Information and Education Center and Claudia Burnet, a Utah parent.

Unofficial commentary:

I like to see coalitions like Competitive America taking on the Latino education crisis, because it really drives home the fact that our education system - its failures and its successes - affects the rest of our society. Business leaders should be concerned about how our nation's schools are working, because the students sitting in today's classrooms will be their future workers. They should be especially concerned about the Latino population as the fastest-growing minority group in the country.

Involving groups like Competitive America in the ed reform debate helps us maintain a wide perspective on the problem - and its possible solutions. I'll be the first to admit that it's sometimes difficult to take a panoramic view on how different reforms affect our society - too often, I am primarily concerned with how a specific reform strategy will affect a group of kids, a school, or a district. It is a challenge (a daily and necessary challenge) to view these efforts in light of the positive results that they can offer to our country's economy, justice system, social services, etc. So that's what I take away from Competitive America - a challenge to keep a wide perspective.

And of course, in the interest of full disclosure, I should mention that Competitive America is a project of CREO, but were it not, I would be fond of it anyway.