EthnicMajority

(AZ Central) A new report says Arizona hasn't made much progress in closing the educational-achievement gap for Latinos in the past decade, and it predicts dire consequences to the state's economy if nothing changes.

Despite various efforts to improve education, Latinos in Arizona score lower on state standardized tests than White students, have higher dropout rates and are less likely to get a bachelor's degree, according to a report released Friday by Arizona State University's Morrison Institute for Public Policy.

One example of how the educational-achievement gap has changed little in the past 10 years: The percentage of Latinos ages 25 to 34 who had a bachelor's degree or higher increased only 1 percentage point to a total of 9 percent, compared with 32 percent for Whites.

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(Huffington Post) Fifteen years ago, California voters were asked: Should colleges consider a student's race when they decide who gets in and who doesn't?

With an emphatic "no," they made California the first state to ban the use of race and ethnicity in public university admissions, as well as hiring and contracting.

Since then, California's most selective public colleges and graduate schools have struggled to assemble student bodies that reflect the state's demographic mix.

Universities around the country could soon face the same challenge. The U.S. Supreme Court is set to revisit the thorny issue of affirmative action less than a decade after it endorsed the use of race as a factor in college admissions.

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Youths from African American, Native American, and Latino backgrounds are underrepresented in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math (known as STEM subjects). Although having a mentor of the same ethnicity is widely seen as one way to engage these youths in STEM subjects, no study has asked these young people if they consider having a mentor who shares their background to be important. Now a new study of African American and Latino youths has found that having a "matched" mentor does matter, but only if having such a mentor is considered important by the adolescent.

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(Atlantic Wire) Sure, it's an informal survey, but a New York Times reporter's finding that eight black college students he spoke to have been stopped by police a collective 92 times is still a disturbing reminder of how the NYPD wields its stop-and-frisk tactics too heavily against the city's minorities. In The Times article on New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly's aboutface on the efficacy of stop-and-frisk, Michael Powell talked to group of eight black men currently attending the Borough of Manhattan Community College. "Cumulatively, they said they had been stopped 92 times."

That 11.5 friskings per-person, on average, is shocking, although it's anecdotal evidence, but it's the stories of these these kids being frisked for seemingly doing nothing other than driving or riding the subway while black that are alarming.

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“Every leader that commits to this work can have a massive impact on their kids, regardless of background,” said Griffith, who has worked at the education corps for 10 years. “But I’ve also seen how a corps member of color can be a role model for his/her students that has a profound impact beyond being an excellent teacher.”

Griffith, 32, said that seeing more black male teachers can inspire students in and outside the classroom.

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(Austin Statesman) Dropout rates, graduation rates, retention rates, passing rates for standardized tests — the education arena is flush with statistics.

Now, a private foundation in Houston is seeking to cut through the noise and focus attention in Texas on what it considers the single most valuable measure of educational effectiveness: the percentage of eighth-graders at public schools who go on to earn a postsecondary degree or certificate within six years of their expected high school graduation date.

A study commissioned by the foundation, the Houston Endowment, found that only about 1 in 5 eighth-graders earns such a credential

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(Huffington Post) In a time when more than half of the country's total population growth was driven by an increase in the Hispanic population, the academic achievement and subsequent economic role of Latinos is of interest to many.

This week, the Washington D.C.-based non-profit Excelencia in Education released a report that lists the 25 colleges that see the most Latinos graduate from their institutions – many of them in the south.

The report, entitled, "Finding Your Workforce: The Top 25 Institutions Graduating Latinos," also highlights the strides and shortcomings that U.S. Latinos face in terms of post-secondary college attainment.

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(Yahoo Sports) A high-profile high school in one of the wealthiest districts of the San Antonio region finds itself under fire after its fans chanted "USA, USA, USA" following its boys basketball team's regional final victory against a team made up predominantly of Hispanic players.

As reported by KENS5.com, the Alamo Heights (Texas) High boys basketball team's regional title celebrations were marred by the aforementioned "USA" chants, which came from the school's fan section in the school's Littleton Gym.

While San Antonio Independent School District athletics director Gil Garza insisted that Alamo Heights boys basketball coach Andrew Brewer acted quickly to quash the inflammatory chants, the school at which they were directed — San Antonio (Texas) Edison High — filed an official complaint about the incident with the University Interscholastic League, the governing body which oversees Texas public high school extracurricular activities.

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(Black Voice News) A new government study suggests that as a student, you’re far more likely to face arrest if you happen to be African American than if you’re Caucasian.

The numbers are jarring. Black students are more than three-and-a-half times as likely as white students to be suspended or expelled, according to the Education Department's Office for Civil Rights' survey, known as the “Civil Rights Data Collection.” More than 70 percent of students arrested in school or handed over to law enforcement were black or Hispanic.

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(USAToday) Affirmative action in college admissions is back on the national radar as the Supreme Court is likely to hear a case involving the University of Texas this year. But a high court ruling may not settle this divisive debate.

In the nine years since the justices said public universities could consider race in admissions, four states have banned the use of race by public universities, and Oklahoma voters will decide this fall whether to join them. At least five other states don't use race, either.

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