The College Experience—Latino Style

For Guadalupe Nuñez and Abraham Peña, making the transition from high school to college as Latino students has been a challenging experience.

“I’m sure there were many Latinos at my high school who decided not to go to college,” says Nuñez, who attended high school in Mesa, Ariz. “Not because they didn’t want to go, but because they didn’t know what they had to do to get in.”

Nuñez, a freshman pre-law major, took it upon herself to find out what Arizona State University had to offer.

“My high school’s career center just pointed students toward the paperwork that needed to be completed for college,” says Nuñez, a first generation college student. “There were no guidelines or instructions given to me, but I knew I wanted to go to college.”

Peña is a freshman majoring in social work. He says the high school he attended in Puyallup, Wash., was more attentive to his needs.

“Granted, there were very few Latinos at my school,” says Peña, also a first generation college student. “But my school really encouraged all the students to attend college. Once I decided to attend ASU, I still wasn’t sure what to expect.”

Nuñez and Peña are members of the largest growing population of minority students at ASU—Latinos. In 1989, Latinos made up 5.8 percent (2,536 students) of the entire student population. In 2001, Latino students made up 10.4 percent (5,480 students), according to a report by the Office of Institutional Analysis.

The numbers can be deceiving. More than half of all Latino students who arrive at ASU will eventually drop out.

Leonard Valverde is the executive director of the Hispanic Border Leadership Institute and an ASU professor of educational leadership and policy studies. He says this high drop out rate could be attributed to a lack of survival skills. Latino students find it tough to make the transition from high school to college.

Academic programs like Head Start and Title 1 enhance the educational development of low-income children and their families. However, Valverde says that Latino students need to make an effort to “educate themselves aggressively” about the programs and academic support available at the university level.

“Since 1965, Head Start has been providing many children with the opportunity to become familiar with an academic setting before they officially enter their scholastic careers,” he says.

“The same type of preparation needs to be made before Latino students enter college. The smartest thing that any student can do is to become familiar with the university they plan to attend,” says Valverde, a second generation Mexican-American and the first in his family to attend college. “I don’t mean simply knowing where classes will be; I mean recognizing and building a support system that will help through their college career.”

The researchers concluded that a lack of preparation and the establishment of a proper support system are hurdles Latino students fail to clear. As a result, they are unsuccessful in higher education.

Baltazar Arispe y Acevedo Jr. is the founding president of the Community College Without Walls in Houston. He never considered attending college until he and his family established a support system with his high school assistant principal, Delia Barron.

“For a lot of us (Latinos), our only mentors were really our parents,” Acevedo says. “My parents never went to a school in their life. They really couldn’t provide me with an idea, let alone the motivation to attend college.”

Barron paid out of her own pocket for Acevedo to take the SAT exams. “She really helped me see that attending college was a tangible thing and not just something other people talked about,” he says.

Acevedo admits his case might seem ideal, but his struggles went beyond academic.

“I performed well in school because I was very well read,” says Acevedo, who suffered from polio when he was younger. “I spent a lot of time in the Shriner’s Hospital in San Francisco. I read all of Shakespeare’s books. I read volumes of the encyclopedia up to volume E.

“Even so, I failed English and Algebra right off the bat,” he admits. “But I got A’s in Biology, American History, and in American Government, so I knew I could succeed. That success helped me stay motivated.”

Acevedo eventually went on to earn his doctorate degree in education from the University of Southern California.

For some Latinos, self-motivation is not enough to succeed. Acevedo says understanding their rights as students through university policies and procedures, can often provide additional guidance to students seeking a degree.

Most colleges and universities use the concept of in loco parentis to deal with matters involving student behavior and conduct. However, there is some lack of clarity in matters that involve faculty prerogatives, such as an instructor giving a student a failing grade, especially in questionable situations that may have involved non-academic factors.

Roberto Haro is a professor of ethnic studies at San Francisco State University. He says that a Latino’s upbringing, in these types of cases, can hamper the student’s success rate in college.

“As a child, a Latina is taught that talking back when addressing adult figures is not a proper thing to do,” Haro says. “Most Latinos are brutalized when they do this, because to other Latinos, they are not showing respect for themselves or adults.

“White students are brought up to be very verbal,” he says. “In an academic setting, if both students disagreed with the grade a professor handed them, the White student might be more motivated to speak up and argue his or her case. A Latino student would accept the grade, even though they might have a strong argument and credible evidence to support a grade change.”

In February 2002, researchers at the Hispanic Border Leadership Institute completed a major study. Their work examined how Latino students progress through the education systems in Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico and Texas. The numbers are not encouraging.

Valverde says there is a “drastic” decrease in the number of Latino students who are enrolled from kindergarten to grade 12 to the graduate level. The researchers found that of the 31.3 percent of Latinos who graduate from high school, only 6.8 percent will enroll in college at the graduate level.

“It’s crucial that Latinos understand the importance of obtaining as much education as possible,” Valverde says. “Society deals a hand to everyone and it’s each person’s responsibility to learn what to do with those cards.”

Despite what the research shows, Nuñez and Peña say they plan to use their cards wisely and try their best to complete their education at ASU.

“I know I can do it,” says Nuñez, who would like to eventually work with the United Nations. “I earned scholarships to attend ASU, so I must be doing something right.”

“It’s an honor to be attending college,” says Peña, who plans to join the Peace Corps after graduation. “I have confidence that I will finish and be successful.” —Manuel Romero