Hispanic Dropouts There Is a Crisis Going

¶ … Hispanic Dropouts

There is a crisis going on in elementary and secondary educational forums. It is a crisis that many have ignored and it is a crisis that needs to be addressed in school districts and in the individual classroom immediately.

Studies show that more than one out of ten Hispanic students drop out of school every year. Though Hispanic students only make up twelve percent of the high school population in the United States, they make up twenty-two percent of the dropouts. When all students in all age ranges are taken into account, Hispanic students make up over half of the annual dropouts across the country.

There is a contingent of people who believe that this tremendously high dropout rate is based on the fact that many of the dropouts did not develop appropriate language skills when they came to the U.S. This perception is emphatically wrong. A recent study of Texas dropouts concluded that eighty-five percent of all dropouts in that state were born in the United States. This particular figure indicates that the problem goes far beyond the skills provided in English as a Second Language courses.

A recent article entitled Our Nation in the Fast Lane, concluded that the high dropout rates among Hispanic students are not caused by a single mitigating factor. Instead the dropouts are caused by a series of ineffectual strategies throughout the entire educational system.

There are two common strategies that are highly ineffectual in retaining Hispanic youth. The first is the Deficit Model Strategy. This particular strategy attempts to change the characteristics of the student from what he or she is into what the school is capable of educating. Unfortunately, when students are unable to change their perceptions from their world view into what the school would like them to be, they are punished with poor grades and a lack of acceptance. In other words, the school blames the student population instead of looking at itself.

For a truly effective environment, the deficit model must be dismissed. Instead, the students and the school need to find a middle ground from which they might work to create a more accessible education.

The second ineffectual strategy is the Elitist Model. In this particular case, a great deal of money is spent. Programs are added to the school and from the outside it looks as if teachers and administrators are doing their duty. However, it is not uncommon for these extra programs to be built for the students that are already doing well. More advanced calculus classes are not going to help the student who is at the bottom of the learning curve. Education will not trickle down from the top students in a class to the bottom.

Throughout the history of education in the United States there has been a particular perception of why people go to school and why certain students are motivated to get good grades. This perception comes from a white middle-class viewpoint. It does not take into account what other groups find valuable. The result is that those educators that come from this viewpoint have an incredibly hard time understanding why Hispanic students are dropping out or why they don't appear to want to do better in school.

A new perspective must be developed. Educators must make an active effort to discover what motivates students that do not come from middle class American families. In this same attempt to find motivation, focus should always be placed on what the students and their families have to give, not what they lack.

Educators have to understand that as students come from different backgrounds so too do the reasons for dropping out. There is no catch all. There is tremendous diversity in the student population and every case is different. A single program at a single school may help a few "at-risk" students, but it's not going to help them all.

To combat the dropout rate, first and foremost, every school district and every individual teacher must work together to develop strategies that will retain students. Programs must be developed that specialize in the prevention of dropouts and the recovery of those who have already dropped out. And most importantly, when a program shows some element of success, information concerning the strategies within that program must be disseminated at a national level.

Within the districts particular strategies have already proved to be somewhat effective. First, schools must work to develop a relationship with a family, not just the student. It is common for teachers to leave parents out of the equation when working with students. Parents are a tremendously helpful aspect to the problem. Within this first strategy, both the community and the parents need to be recognized as contributing factors to a student's possible success or failure. The vast majority of the parents out there are trying to promote their children's success in school and as a result they are open to teachers and districts that bring about new ideas to create that success. The parents must be seen by educators as teachers, resources, decision makers, and as leaders. Respect for parents can be a phenomenally powerful thing.

Secondly, schools and districts must provide the appropriate education to the teachers. The shortsightedness of many educators is a correctable problem. Professional development must be provided wherein the teachers have an opportunity to learn how to view children in different ways.

There is certainly a large contingent of students that are suffering due to a lack of understanding of basic English. In California alone, it is estimated that there is a deficit of over 21,000 bilingual or English as a Second Language teachers. Students who do not understand the teacher's instructions are doomed to fail. This seems to be an obvious place for intervention by those in higher education or in the government.