DEAL OF THE DAY

Local educators who work with Latino students say the most effective way to combat the achievement gap is through early intervention, before the child even reaches kindergarten.

By SCOTT MARTINDALE / THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

More Hispanic parents must be educated about early childhood development and the important role they play in their children's schooling, experts say, in the wake of an alarming new study that indicates Hispanic students are underperforming their white counterparts by the same wide margins as they were two decades ago.

The U.S. Department of Education report, released June 23, shows the achievement gap between white and Hispanic students has not closed at all since the early 1990s, with the overall difference between the groups remaining above 20 points, or roughly two grade levels, on a scale of 0 to 500.

Article Tab: Roxana Rodriguez speaks at a reception last month for the Latino Educational Attainment Initiative at the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana. Rodriguez shared how through the help of the program, she was the first one ever in her family to graduate from college. Rodriguez is a success story, but experts say immense challenges remain to close the achievement gap between Hispanic and white students.

Roxana Rodriguez speaks at a reception last month for the Latino Educational Attainment Initiative at the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana. Rodriguez shared how through the help of the program, she was the first one ever in her family to graduate from college. Rodriguez is a success story, but experts say immense challenges remain to close the achievement gap between Hispanic and white students.

�With everything that the state of California is trying to do, it's frustrating that the achievement gap really hasn't moved,� said Alicia Berhow, administrator for the Latino Educational Attainment Initiative, an outreach project of the Orange County Business Council.

�We are not waiting for the state or school districts to help us with our children here in Orange County,� Berhow said. �We're taking the bull by the horns and going out into the communities where the parents are, teaching them that this is what you need to know so your kids will succeed.�

The report shows a 21-point gap in math between fourth-grade Hispanic and white students in 2009. At grade eight, the gap rises to 26 points.

The gap is similarly wide in reading � 25 points in fourth grade and 24 in eighth.

California fares even worse than the U.S. average, trailing the nation by 4 to 7 points in fourth- and eight-grade reading and math.

Early intervention is key

Local educators who work with Latino students and other underperforming minorities say the most effective way to combat this systemic problem is through early intervention, before the child even reaches kindergarten.

That in itself is a challenge, though, because many Latino parents tend not to understand the importance of the early years of a child's development, said Virginia Mann, founder of a UC Irvine-based preschool intervention program that targets parents in Santa Ana. Consequently, these parents tend to set up their children for failure in school.

"Young Latino parents have a lot of odd views � they believe they will hurt their children if they teach them Spanish, or they believe the TV will educate them because, oh, it's in English," said Mann, a UCI cognitive sciences professor and director of the Home Activities Building Language Acquisition program, or HABLA.

"When these kids enter kindergarten and try to learn English, but they don't know their colors and shapes in Spanish, it's a double whammy," Mann said. "I've seen where these children stumble � they don't have a good enough vocabulary. They haven't even learned to write their name; they think their name is mijo."

Sticking a child in front of a TV, even to watch English-language educational shows like "Sesame Street," is not an acceptable alternative, Mann added.

If preschoolers aren't in a rich, stimulating environment that includes being engaged in conversation daily and mastering a language � any language � they are automatically going to be behind in kindergarten, a setback from which they may never recover, Mann said.

Cultural forces at work

Although Orange County is home to a number of Latino outreach programs, including HABLA and the Latino Educational Attainment Initiative, cultural forces in Latino communities can sometimes overpower their effectiveness.

Fullerton parent Estanislao Rodriguez, who emigrated from Mexico 21 years ago, said many Latino immigrants tend to self-impose personal limitations, and those limitations hinder their kids as well. It's a vicious cycle that's difficult to break, Rodriguez said.

"The families that helped me immigrate back in 1990 � I can sadly say they live the same way they left our country of Mexico," said Rodriguez, who has three kids, 9, 14 and 18. "They still talk the same, behave the same, dress the same, and have all kinds of limitations in their mind.

"Instead of encouraging their kids, the parents say, 'You're not going to make it in college; you've got to go to work,'" said Rodriguez, president of the parent-led English Learner Advisory Committee at Woodcrest Elementary in Fullerton.

"When I talk to parents, they bring up cheap excuses for not being supportive of their kids and not attending school meetings. It's sad that they drive their cars to the parking lot, take their kids out of the car and leave. They don't know what happens after that."

For the parents who are willing to listen and learn, resources are abundant. The Fullerton Collaborative, a project of the Fullerton School District, acts as a mentor, cheerleader, support network and friend to Latino parents in Fullerton, helping them understand how to navigate even the most basic aspects of the U.S. school system, said Pam Keller, executive director for the Fullerton Collaborative.

"Some of them come from places where you would never question the teacher � it would be rude to ask a question," Keller said. "Here you're expected to be a partner. It just takes a little prodding and a little pushing. These parents care about their kids just like anyone else."

Gains being made

While no one denies the achievement gap between Hispanic students and their white counterparts remains vast, the recent findings do not mean Hispanic students aren't making gains.

English language learners tend to drag down the average test scores for Hispanic students as a whole. In fourth-grade reading, for example, the gap between white students and Hispanics who are not English language learners has declined from 24 points in 1998 to 15 points in 2009. In contrast, the gap between white fourth-graders and Hispanic English language learners was almost triple that � at 44 points.

Also, Hispanic students are making gains � it's just that they're making those gains at the same rate as white students, said George Farkas, a UC Irvine professor of education.

"It's a moving target to narrow the gap," said Farkas, an expert on the achievement gap among ethnic and socioeconomic minority groups. "To narrow the gap, the minority children have to gain more than the white middle-class children, and that's a tall order when you're already starting with a disadvantage."

Farkas said that given higher poverty levels and other challenges with the U.S. Hispanic population, it's commendable that federal and state officials would even aspire to close the achievement gap.

"No other nation has set as a public policy goal to narrow achievement gaps by income or race and ethnicity," Farkas said. "The fact that we have made it such an explicit public policy, and put unbelievable � perhaps unfair � pressure on teachers and principals, is to our credit."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Whenever many of my friends, acquaintances, and other brethren think of Hispanics, they think of a hard working class who doesn't get the recognition they deserve. When I think of Hispanics, I think of all the times me and mine have attempted to hire them in order to save money in labor costs, only to end up losing ten fold in theft and other crime. I think of a criminal class with whom I have nothing at all in common whose open and outright hatred of racial purity drips off them like Soylent Green every time they sneer "blanco" at a passing White. I think of Catholics who follow their Pope and openly promote legalized sodomy under the guise of "gay marriage" and "gay rights" who don't understand the first thing about Economics 101 nor Protestantism. I think of the first Hispanice ever to hold high office, Alberto Gonzalez, whose Harvard classmates unanimously declared through the New York Times that he didn't have a first grade understanding of the U.S. Constitution. I think of "white hispanics" who claim to be White, who brag that they check the box "White" on forms, but who as a group score only 6 points higher than Mexicans in SAT math and only 5 points higher in SAT verbal (compared to 58 and 62 points lower than Whites, respectively, and 86 and 22 points lower than Asians). I think of a group of losers who the Census Bureau reports have even lower weekly earnings than blacks, with Hispanic women earning $67 and Hispanic men earning $105 less (compared to $155 and $251 lower than Whites, respectively). I think of a class whose net contribution to the economy is a NEGATIVE quarter of a trillion dollars, *officially*, compared to a cool one TRILLION DOLLARS for blacks.

The Invasion of Hispanics

People of Mexican origin grew by 7.1 million over the decade, accounting for most of the increase of 12.9 million in the nation's Hispanic population, according to a national head count a year ago. Nearly 21 million people told the census they were of Mexican origin, and they make up more than 58 percent of U.S. Hispanics.

in 1993 there were 191 million Whites and 22 million Hispanics, or 89.7% Whites and 10.3% Hispanics, who had a combined homicide rate of 3.6. Do you know of any reason that American Whites should have committed homicide rate higher than mostly White North Dakota or 0.2, or at most Ireland at 0.6? I don't either, but let's be conservative and use 0.6.

Such a homicide rate for Hispanics is half their rate in Colombia of 60, but consistent with Venezuela and Los Angeles of 30. Los Angeles is unique because it's the only American city which had the distinction of being the Murder Capitol of the World which wasn't due to blacks--instead, it was due to Hispanics.

So you see, most of the "White on White" homicides were actually Hispanic on Hispanic.

Just for kicks, here's the calculation if Whites actually have a homicide rate of 0.2:

Washington Post

What does such a dramatic increase in the population of Mexicans, to 7.2% of the American population, mean to the average American? Most people don't even think about it because the facts are concealed from them. You wouldn't known from the media, for example, that the presence of Mexicans already reduces the nation's average SAT scores by 19 points. Most people don't even know that their SAT scores are 131 points lower than Whites and only 86 points higher than blacks. The Bureau of Justice Statistics expertly conceals the fact that they are almost 7 times more likely than Whites and 62% as likely as blacks to be murderers. And the Bureau of Labor Statistics is just as good at concealing that they earn 78% as much as Whites but 27% more than blacks.

Why the shell game with Mexicans? In many government statistics, this 7.2% of the American population is counted as "White". The most detailed breakdown by race seems to be when they are included as Hispanics, versus "non-Hispanic White", which conceals the fact that Mexicans have hardly any Hispanic blood in them at all. They are so close to Indians in SAT (426 vs 428) and GRE (475 vs 479) scores, and incomes ($33,750 vs $30,784) that they are clearly Indians, not Hispanics. Those who consider themselves to be "other Hispanics", who are 3.5% of the population, score only 6 SAT points higher than Mexicans and 56 points higher than blacks, compared to 58 points lower than Whites and 86 points lower than Asians, which suggests that the amount of Hispanic blood is low to nonexistent. Spain consistently scores higher than the US in IAEP (432 vs 420, and 495 vs 494 for 9 and 13 year olds), so you would expect that true "Hispanics" would score much closer to Whites than to blacks.

If all blacks and Hispanics had SAT verbal scores equivalent to Whites and SAT math scores equivalent to Asians, the nation's average SAT scores would be 51 points higher. If they committed murder at a rate equivalent to Whites, the murder rate would be two thirds lower than it is. If they earned as much as Whites, average incomes would be 8% higher.

It can be seen from the following graphs that Mexicans and Indians are not only the same race, but they are a race which is separate and distinct from Caucasoids, Negroids, and Asians. Even though there is no data available regarding their cranial capacity, their incomes, test scores, and crime rates suggest that the cranial capacity of Mexicans should be 1,313 cc's and that for Indians should be 1,314.

This puts them in a range which is 3.55% larger than blacks and 3.73% smaller than Whites. This might not seem like a big difference, but it represents 300 million cortical neurons. When you consider the vast differences between Asian, European, Indian, and African societies, these cortical neurons are literally the difference between life versus death, wealth versus poverty, justice versus crime, and technological achievements versus living in mud huts with mud floors. It's the difference between being productive members of an economy, versus being an annual net drain of $128.2 billion as American Mexicans are, and $603 billion as American blacks are. It's the difference between living in a stable society versus living as a refugee, as half the citizens of Liberia now do.

Many of the characteristics which distinguish one of the hundreds of species of snakes, or one of the 32,000 species of orchids, from one another almost require a microscope to detect. But the characteristics of human "races" which distinguish one from another stick out like a sore thumb. Nobody has any trouble identifying a Negroid, nor an Asian, nor a White European (Caucasoid), nor an Indian [American style].

These four groups [at least four] are SO different from one another other that it's literally misleading to call them "races". These four different "races" should be considered by biologists to be four different species. Mexicans have a 3.5% larger cranial capacity than blacks, Indians have an almost identical cranial capacity to Indians, Whites have a 3.7% larger cranial capacity than Indians and Mexicans, and Asians have a 3.8% larger cranial capacity than Whites.

So what? Well, having a few hundred million extra cortical neurons helps quite a bit when doing standardized tests. Mexicans score 13.3% higher in SAT and 14.2% higher in GRE than blacks. Indians score almost identical to Mexicans.Whites score 14.5% and 12.7%, respectively, higher than Mexicans, and Asians score 5.7% and 10.5% higher than Whites.

All of this helps to become more productive members of economies. Mexicans earn 26.8% more than blacks, Indians earn just about as much as Mexicans, Whites earn 40.6% more than Indians, and Asians earn 12.3% more than Whites.

It also has a serious impact on social skills. Mexicans are half as likely to be murderers as blacks, Indians are just about equal to Mexicans as murderers, Whites are 1/7th as likely as Indians or Mexicans to be murderers, and Asians are 1/10th as likely as Whites to be murderers. The relative incarceration rates suggest that these proportions apply across the board to all crimes.

If you added up the economic value of all of the characteristics which distinguish 32,000 different species of orchids from one another and hundreds of different species of snakes, they would have a value which is far less than that of one single one of these differences in characteristics between one single "race".

You voted

Score: 0

Name withheld

yanque

9:40 AM on July 17, 2011

This comment is hidden because you have chosen to ignore yanque.Show Details Hide Details

Well, you'll be happy to hear that those Mexican high schools are starting to see our high schools as a joke, and are staying home. The story:
Why Are Mexicans Staying Home? (12:07PM)
http://www.kcrw.com/news/programs/tp/tp110712immigration_from_mex

Here's a synopsis:
In the 1990's, conditions in Mexico produced a flood of illegal immigrants to the United States. Harsh new state laws, tougher border enforcement and criminal gangs make crossing into the US without papers a lot harder than it used to be. But 90 percent of the Mexicans who want to cross illegally can actually make it. So why has the flood of illegal immigrants been reduced to a trickle? The biggest reason is education, producing more children with greater skills than their parents. With investment creating new jobs, they want to stay home. Mexico has by no means solved all its problems, but it's changing fast � with not just one, but two middle classes. We hear what it all means for the US.

Hispanics

Hispanic achievement gap persists despite interventions

politico

Name withheld

Name withheld

englishlover30

Name withheld

smthintosay

Name withheld

buttercupnb

Name withheld

Name withheld

buttercupnb

Name withheld

vasquez1

Name withheld

buttercupnb

Name withheld

ocavatar

Name withheld

yanque

The Invasion of Hispanics

Washington Post