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Alondra Rivera
Jaya Dubey
Writing 39C
18 October 2015

Hispanics and the Educational Attainment (Draft 2)

Heres a fact that may not surprise you: the children of the rich perform better in school, on average, than children from middle-class or poor families. Students growing up in richer families
have better grades and higher standardized test scores, on average, than poorer studentshigher
graduation rates and higher rates of college enrollment and completion. (The New York Times)

With Los Angeles having a high population of Hispanics we have to start of with the facts
starting off with the difference between this location and others that makes education amongst
different racial groups extremely different. In Los Angeles just 45% of the students in the Los
Angeles Unified School District completed all four years of high school successfully, compared
with the national graduation average of 70% because research illustrates that students in urban
public schools are less likely to graduate high school than those students enrolled in suburban
locations. (LA TIMES) The educational attainment is a powerful predictor that helped determine
that statistic of those who graduated high school in the LAUSD, but it also determines the students well being, it helps establish the students economic success, predicts unemployment,
measures the individuals future health, and socio-economic well being, and finally helps detect
the likelihood of those students getting a divorce or getting incarcerated. When it comes to the
rates of higher educational attainment the gaps between the lowest race hispanics have to
change now or else more children will continue to get affected as the years go by.

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From the 1980s until present times the employed population in California of 18 to 34
year olds has decreased from around 71 percent in the 1980s to 60% in 2013. The result of this
decline has to do with the
employment of our youth,
primarily because more
hispanics are falling into
the educational attainment
gap and do not exceed their
education after high school.
The educational attainment
in Californiaparticularly
high school completionvaries significantly by race/ethnicity. As the graph shows, in 2012,
37.3% of Latinos had not completed high school, compared to 9.7% of African Americans, 9.1%
of Asians, and 4.6% of whites. This gap is troubling given that Latinos represent about 35% of
Californias working-age population. (Public Policy Institute of California) The problem with the
educational gap is that as whites, asians, and blacks rise in substantial speeds; the hispanic community tends to progress only at gradual pace. The reason there is such slow speeds for the hispanic community is that urban minority schools and whiter and wealthier schools focus their attention in contrasting ways. Such as the whites schools hire more highly qualified and experienced teachers (Clotfelter, Ladd, & Vigdor, 2005; Rivkin, Hanushek, & Kain, 2005). They normalize a school and community climate that encourages homework completion, academic
achievement, regular attendance, and college enrollment (Kahlenberg, 2001); and finally they

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offer students more advanced and challenging curricula (Rumberger & Palardy, 2005). While on
the other hand hispanics schools primarily those in the LAUSD have factors interfering with the
students success. Unlike richer schools, these LA schools have proven that teachers tend to give
more negative than positive feedback to their minority students. A students race thus determines
the teachers level of interaction and involvement he/she will have with the student. (Cooper and
Allen). This is harmful in the sense that low poverish schools cannot afford the best teachers, nor
have the best classes, but by having teachers not helping solve the problem affects the hispanic
community greatly. Another huge problem with the achievement gap in LAUSD is income. While 48.4% of Hispanics are
living in Los Angeles County, 27% of them are living in poverty. Yet another ten percent of Latinos live in deep poverty
(with incomes below 50% of the federal poverty threshold),
compared to seven percent of all people in the United States.
(Feeding America) Whereas whites make up for only 10% livOur education is like this image; they expects so
highly of those who do not have the resources to
achieve academically.

ing in poverty. And yet, the incomes of the rich continues to

grow faster in the last 30 years than the incomes of the middle

class and the poor. The reason the rich end up doing better socioeconomically is because money
helps families provide cognitively stimulating experiences for their young children in the sense
that it establishes a more secure home environment, more time for parents to communicate and
read with their children, and more access to higher-quality child care and preschool. (The New
York Times) On the other hand the educational gap is so wide because Latino students are disproportionally taught easier material than white or Asian kid. Another factor is that many His-

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panic students are children of Mexican immigrants who did not complete high school thus, them
not being able to provide academic resources and tutoring, and finally with 27% of hispanics living in poverty, the main concern is not attending school with getting the best grades. Their main
worry is how they will pay rent, or for those without healthcare worry about how they are going
to take care of their family when someone gets ill. It is apparent that for young adults living in
such a family oriented environment to want to work now in order to make ends meet at that time,
instead of having to go to school, attend college, and then finally being able to make some sort of
income thats not one hundred percent guaranteed.
With a projection that Hispanics will account for the 30% of the US population by 2030,
now is the time that minorities need to become our majority when it comes to education. If trends
continue to illustrate hispanics having the highest drop out rates (over 1 million) then how will
our nation start succeeding? Various effects come into play when it comes to the educational
achievement hispanics encounter on a daily basis. Such as children in impoverished neighborhoods are surrounded by more crime and violence and suffer from greater stress that interferes
with learning (Buka, Stichick, Birdthistle, & Earls, 2001; Burdick-Will et al., 2010; Farah et al.,
2006). Also children with less exposure to mainstream society are less familiar with the standard
English thats necessary for their future success (Sampson, Sharkey, & Raudenbush, 2008). It
makes sense since English is not most hispanics first language and even when it comes to state
testing and ACTs that whites score double the percentages when it comes to English and writing. When it comes to standardized test scores; in California 44% of students achieved targets for
their grade in English yet in LA Unified, the amount was only 25%. (LA TIMES) Subsequently,

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an effect of having low education results in

less hispanics continuing on to college or getting high paying jobs. The United States Census Bureau as represented in the graphs clearly demonstrates the connection between how
The blue bars represent the whole United States, while the red
bars represent just Californias population.

many of our nations youth is employed and how the numbers face a substantial decrease, yet coincidently as the employed numbers go down the amount of people living in poverty ages 18 to
34 goes up. Continuing, as the educational gap gets worse, it doesnt just have to do with academics but the factors behind it is what contributes to the harm. Such as with hispanics not having
any nor qualified health care tend to show that children have greater absenteeism (Aysola, Orav,
& Ayanian, 2011; Starfield, 1997), and they cant benefit from good schools if they are not
present. An alarming effect of LAUSD is that coming from a low-educational background represents majors obstacles to achieving a high level of education. This risk factors, especially in poor
childrens families and communities escalates the possibility of mental health problems in childhood, adolescence and throughout life. It also impacts on loss of productivity, task being done
ineffectively, and societal consequences. The problem is by exposing children to low education it
eventually could correlate to poor mental
health, substance abuse, violence, and lower
educational achievements. (Mental Health in
Youth and Education) In hence, by closing the

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educational attainment in the hispanic community can contribute to better health psychical and
mental health. To conclude, educational settings indubitably play a crucial role in securing childrens rights and providing the necessary support system to allow the early identification of emotional, social, and mental difficulties and effective resolution for these problems. Equally better
health leads to better education. (MHYE)
As the problem of the educational gap not being

Mendoza, Martha. "Latino Academic Achievement Gap Persists." The Huffington Post.
TheHuffingtonPost.com, 25 Jan. 2014. Web. 17 Oct. 2015. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
2013/12/23/latino-achievement-gap_n_4492908.html>.
Blume, Howard. "New California Tests Present Sobering Picture of Student
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www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-new-test-results-20150908-story.html>.
Blume, Howard. "New California Tests Present Sobering Picture of Student
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www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-new-test-results-20150908-story.html>.
Jan-Llopis, E. & Braddick, F. (Eds). (2008) Mental Health in Youth and Education. Consensus paper. Luxembourg: European Communities. <http://ec.europa.eu/health/archive/ph_determinants/life_style/mental/docs/consensus_youth_en.pdf
Darling-Hammond, Linda. "Unequal Opportunity: Race and Education." The Brookings
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1998/03/spring-education-darling-hammond>.
"Latino Hunger Fact Sheet." Feeding America. Feeding America, 2015. Web. 19 Oct. 2015.
<http://www.feedingamerica.org/hunger-in-america/impact-of-hunger/latino-hunger/latinohunger-fact-sheet.html>.

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Reardorn, Sean. "No Rich Child Left Behind." Opinionator No Rich Child Left Behind
Comments. 27 Apr. 2013. Web. 11 Oct. 2015. <http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/27/
no-rich-child-left-behind/?ref=opinion>.
"Poverty." About. U.S. Census Bureau, 16 Sept. 2015. Web. 14 Oct. 2015. <https://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/about/overview/index.htm
Manuel, Jens. "Hispanics Only Group to See Its Poverty Rate Decline and Incomes Rise."
Pew Research Center RSS. 19 Sept. 2014. Web. 11 Oct. 2015. <http://www.pewresearch.org/facttank/2014/09/19/hispanics-only-group-to-see-its-poverty-rate-decline-and-incomes-rise/>.
DuBose, Ben. "Urban vs. Suburban: The High School Graduation Gap." Los Angeles
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