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 News from Around the Americas | May 2005 
Corridors Of Empowerment
 Gabriela Rico - Statesman Journal
| | State educators are concerned about the low number of Hispanic students graduating from high school. They hope that by implementing literacy programs in grade school or earlier, the students' transition to high school and beyond will be successful. Shown here is Jorge Torres at Central High School. (Photo: Lori Cain) |
Changing the face of high school graduates to include more Hispanics requires an effort that begins about 12 years before commencement day.
By second grade, it may be too late.
The current picture is bleak, but slowly changing, as teachers struggle to reach Hispanic students who they often don't understand - literally or culturally.
It takes more than teaching just the three R's.
It takes an understanding and tolerance of the cultural nuances by connecting with parents.
It takes an international effort between two countries that share responsibility for these students.
It takes a real commitment.
One program that is fueling optimism begins before a child enters kindergarten.
Olga Cobb, coordinator for the Even Start Family Literacy Program in Salem, said the goal is to illustrate the importance of parental involvement in school by having parents and children learn side-by-side.
The program was founded in 2001 on the premise that help should be on the way long before high school for a student who is struggling.
"By the time a child is 7 or 8 years old, it's too late," Cobb said.
She predicts that the majority of children who participate in the Even Start program will successfully graduate from high school.
Children in these programs increase their understanding of the English language by almost 20 percent and double their English alphabet skills in one school year, according to statistics from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
"It's a chance to succeed," Cobb said. "It's helping parents understand that they have to be there and take these children to school every day."
Even Start is a family literacy program for Salem's lowest-income, second-language families. It gives them an opportunity to improve their educational status, learn English, earn diplomas through the Mexican Institute of National Education for Adults and prepare for the General Equivalence Development Test, or GED.
Cobb said that parent-child interactions predict future literacy success, and by improving the parents' education, children have a higher chance of finishing school.
"Parents become actively involved in their children's literacy development and learn effective ways to model and encourage literacy behaviors," she said. "The program pays particular attention to physical and mental health, nutrition, and social-emotional development, so children will enter school with the readiness skills to succeed."
Noting the growing disparity between the number of Hispanic students enrolling in Oregon public schools and those who graduate, last year the Mexican government stepped in.
The Mexican Consulate in Oregon signed an agreement with the state called the Oregon-Mexico Educational Partnership. The hope is to "bridge the gap between the Mexican students and the rest of the population of students in the state," said Oregon's Consul General Fernando Sánchez Ugarte.
Mexico's curriculum has been aligned with Oregon's educational content standards, so Spanish-speaking students can progress in core subjects and get credit for them as they learn English.
"This agreement is based on the premise that it is important to keep students current in their educational curricula at the same time they are learning English," Sánchez said.
The school work that is completed in Spanish entitles students to receive accreditation in a Mexican institute as they progress in grades, he said.
This approach allows students to stay at their grade level of learning, and not fall behind because they don't understand such things as a history or biology assignment in English.
"The student that undertakes this program will be able to obtain, almost simultaneously, a high school diploma in Oregon and the equivalent accreditation in the Mexican education system," Sánchez said.
Available at 15 sites across the state - including the Willamette Education Service District in Salem - the success of the program is promising but remains to be seen.
For years, Eduardo Angulo, chairman of the Salem/Keizer Coalition for Equality, has fought with the school districts for better outcomes in minority graduation rates.
He dismisses the oft-cited notion that Hispanic parents don't want to be involved with their children's education.
"Latino parents respond wonderfully to a welcoming invitation to be involved, (but) the culture of our schools often makes all parents feel unwelcome," Angulo said. "Latino parents, as well as low-income whites and blacks, need more intervention to help them get involved at a more meaningful level."
He cited the example of Stephens Middle School in Salem where Principal Neil Anderson "went on a mission to hire as many bilingual people as he could to meet the needs of his more than 300 Latino students and their families."
New positions of Hispanic community outreach coordinator and migrant specialist were added and existing positions of office manager, custodian, teachers' aides and several teachers were filled with Spanish speakers.
During the school year, there are monthly meetings with Spanish-speaking parents, giving them the same information that other parents get at the traditional Parent Teacher Organization sessions.
Parents have an opportunity to give feedback and ask questions, "establishing a two-way, meaningful engagement," Angulo said.
In 1969, when Miguel Salinas became the first Hispanic school principal in Oregon, he quickly discovered the importance of parent involvement.
"What makes the most difference is not curriculum, is not evaluation," he said. "It's how the learner and the parents of the learner are connected with the institution."
"Without the parents or the guardians having information about where the child is or where the child is going, there's no way that mom and dad or the uncle or the grandmother ... can really help Juanito," Salinas said.
Simply sending home a school event notice that's written in Spanish isn't enough.
"A lot of schools will tell you, 'Well, we've tried to involve parents, we've sent out bulletins,'" the retired educator said. "Take a marketing approach. If you don't understand the client, I don't give a damn what you send the kid home with."
One way to make parents - and students - feel comfortable at school is by having teachers and administrators that "get them," Salinas said.
"Ninety-five percent of (the) money is spent on personnel, so why are you spending 3 cents on adding more bulletin boards or adding more visuals so Juanito can see himself up on the board if you don't have a teacher?" he said. "If this were to happen in any other business, they would go broke ... yesterday."
High school graduation cannot be the end goal.
Getting more Hispanic students interested and enrolled in higher education is the next challenge.
According to the U.S. Census, Hispanics in Oregon have the lowest percentage of their population enrolled in higher education of any ethnic group.
"Community colleges must make college more affordable to all students, but especially to those students and families who can least afford it," said John Luján, multicultural officer at Chemeketa Community College.
"We have literally priced ourselves out of the market for many Oregon Latino students and families - even those who are academically prepared to do so."
Luján said outreach from the college into the schools helps students see college as an exciting goal - and an attainable one.
"We cannot wish this educational dilemma away or move it to another state." |
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