what kind are you?
Colleges Need to Recognize, and Serve, the 3 Kinds of Latino Students
By MARGARITA MOONEY and DEBORAH RIVAS-DRAKE
What comes to mind when you think of a Latino student attending college in the United States? Do you think of the Chicana who made it, despite the odds, and now leads her campus chapter of the Chicano Caucus? The Latino student who started at his local community college but dropped out after a semester? Or do you think of the child of suburban doctors who attended a mostly white private school and is enrolled in an elite university?
Because of the achievement gap between white and Latino students, most of our knowledge about Latinos in higher education comes from studies of low-achieving students. Consider that, with a dropout rate of 22.4 percent, Latino students age 16 to 24 are less likely to complete high school than not only white students but also African-Americans.
Moreover, the gap between the rate at which Latinos and white students earn bachelor's degrees continues to be large. While 86.4 percent of Americans age 15 to 29 have completed high school, and 28.4 percent have earned bachelor's degrees, only 63.2 percent and 9.5 percent, respectively, of Latinos have done so.
Despite much-warranted concern over those figures, not all Latino students are underachievers. However, we know far less about the cultural and psychological profiles of Latino students who succeed in American higher education than we do about their peers who do not achieve highly.
For that reason, the two of us chose to examine the pathways to success taken by Latino students at 27 elite institutions, comprising 13 private research universities, like Princeton University; nine liberal-arts colleges, like Swarthmore College; and five public research universities, like the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.
In addition to educational credentials, Latinos who graduate from such institutions come away with cultural capital, the formal and informal knowledge that they can use to influence their ethnic communities through their careers as newspaper editors, doctors, politicians, and the like. Thus we feel it important to ask not just about their academic achievement but also about how their college experiences shape their views of society.
Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshmen - a study of nearly 4,000 students who entered elite colleges in 1999, approximately 1,000 of whom were Latino - we first examined differences among Latinos in the sample in how much they perceived barriers to their educational and occupational opportunities. We also drew from in-depth interviews with Latino students at one of the colleges. From responses to questions about minority experience in the United States - encountering discrimination, feeling distant from white people - we identified three distinct sociopsychological profiles among Latinos: assimilation, accommodation, and resistance.
The first group (26 percent of the study sample) did not feel different from their white peers, and they saw the path to achievement as colorblind. For example, they did not think that members of minority groups faced a lot of discrimination; nor did they believe that minority students needed to earn extra credentials to compete in the job market. Because their attitudes about achievement resembled those of non-Latino students, we call them assimilationists. Were these students among the most economically privileged in the sample? Many were, but not all. A prototypical Latino in this group might be someone from a middle-class family who went to a predominantly white school and who had no qualms about achieving his or her dream.
Slightly more Latino students (32 percent) fit the pattern that we call accommodationist. Although students in this group perceived discrimination against members of minority groups, they also believed more strongly than those in the other two categories that minority students who work hard and earn educational credentials will have success in finding good jobs. These students realized that Latinos faced barriers yet had no doubt that they themselves would succeed. They may, indeed, have contrasted their opportunities with those of relatives in Latin America: The immigrant experience provided a source of optimism along with an awareness of discrimination. "I just want to take advantage of the opportunities that I have been given," one student said. "I would just be a fool to sit back and Š work in a factory."
The third group (43 percent) was the most critical of the mainstream ideology that individual effort is sufficient to get ahead. To highlight how their perceptions differed from those of the other two groups, we called these students resisters. Resisters perceived high levels of discrimination against members of minority groups and they said they felt more distant from white students than the other two groups did. Many, but not all, of these students chose a Hispanic-black racial label, and they frequently had attended high schools that were more than 70 percent minority (Latino and African-American combined).
Educators concerned with Latino achievement and with the campus climate for Latinos would do well to pay attention to these three distinct psychological profiles. Some college administrators have remarked to us that diversity programs - although clearly needed - often select people based on their ethnic category, without considering differences in perceptions about ethnicity. For example, some Latinos might feel strange about participating in a diversity program that presumed they perceived a discriminatory environment. At the same time, other Latinos might feel uncomfortable in their college setting. The important point to remember is that the ways in which individuals experience their minority status and perceive blocked opportunity vary enormously among high-achieving Latino college students.
In addition, we found strong evidence that our profiles relate to the social engagement of Latino students but not necessarily to their academic progress. Take resisters. Clearly they felt the most uncomfortable on their campuses. Yet we found that even those Latino students who were most aware of the barriers between themselves and the selective institutions they attended spent as much time on academic activities - six to seven hours a day - as the assimilators and accommodators did. Although there were some differences in the GPA's earned by members of the three groups - ranging from an average of 3.08 for the resisters to 3.13 for the assimilators, such differences were not statistically significant.
Equally striking, statistical differences appeared in a comparison of time spent on extracurricular activities. By their junior year, resisters were spending about two more hours a week in volunteer work and clubs than assimilators were. Many of the Latino students interviewed indicated that they wanted to persist in college out of a sense of obligation to ameliorate some of the disparities they perceived. As one student said, "I think that me being here can help contribute to some other person down the road."
Taken together, our results suggest that - contrary to oppositional culture theory, which posits that students will underachieve for fear of being accused of "acting white" - a strong minority identity and high perception of discrimination can be associated with high academic achievement.
It is also significant that Latino students with a strong minority identity, relative to their Latino peers at the same institutions, spend more time on extracurricular activities. That suggests that one way a Latino might be able to counteract perceived threats or hostility is by becoming part of a smaller community on the campus. At the same time, the nature of those small groups varies. Some actively recruit members by appealing to their ethnic or minority sensibilities; others adopt a colorblind approach to recruiting, emphasizing opportunities to be creative or focusing on helping others as tutors or volunteers.
Our research suggests that the issue of "fit" between a Latino student and a college campus is not only a matter of immigrant background, national origin, or socioeconomic status. Given that Latino students enter college divided into three distinct profiles, it is not surprising that they will differ in their comfort at different institutions. Not thinking about the complex ways in which students make sense of their ethnic heritage and status may lead to investing in campus resources erroneously based on stereotypes.
If the mind-set of young Latinos at elite colleges can vary as much as we have described, would we not expect the psychological profiles among those at other types of colleges to vary as well? As more Latinos enter college, we would all do well to be attuned not just to how they may be different from white, black, or Asian students, but also to what important cultural and psychological differences exist among Latinos themselves.
Although the white-Latino achievement gap still exists, Latinos are nonetheless entering the top rungs of higher education in increasing numbers. Among the elite colleges in the sample we used, student populations ranged from 1 percent to 13 percent Latino, with an average of 5 percent. In our continuing work, we hope to show how Latinos' class, regional, racial, and psychological diversity influences their educational choices and social engagement in college. We hope to contribute both to identifying factors that help explain the achievement gap between Latinos and whites, and to understanding how the college experiences of high-achieving Latinos prepare them to be cultural agents in their own communities and the nation.
Margarita Mooney is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Deborah Rivas-Drake is an assistant professor of education and human development at Brown University.
http://chronicle.com
Section: Commentary
Volume 54, Issue 29, Page A37
Copyright © 2008 by The Chronicle of Higher Education
By MARGARITA MOONEY and DEBORAH RIVAS-DRAKE
What comes to mind when you think of a Latino student attending college in the United States? Do you think of the Chicana who made it, despite the odds, and now leads her campus chapter of the Chicano Caucus? The Latino student who started at his local community college but dropped out after a semester? Or do you think of the child of suburban doctors who attended a mostly white private school and is enrolled in an elite university?
Because of the achievement gap between white and Latino students, most of our knowledge about Latinos in higher education comes from studies of low-achieving students. Consider that, with a dropout rate of 22.4 percent, Latino students age 16 to 24 are less likely to complete high school than not only white students but also African-Americans.
Moreover, the gap between the rate at which Latinos and white students earn bachelor's degrees continues to be large. While 86.4 percent of Americans age 15 to 29 have completed high school, and 28.4 percent have earned bachelor's degrees, only 63.2 percent and 9.5 percent, respectively, of Latinos have done so.
Despite much-warranted concern over those figures, not all Latino students are underachievers. However, we know far less about the cultural and psychological profiles of Latino students who succeed in American higher education than we do about their peers who do not achieve highly.
For that reason, the two of us chose to examine the pathways to success taken by Latino students at 27 elite institutions, comprising 13 private research universities, like Princeton University; nine liberal-arts colleges, like Swarthmore College; and five public research universities, like the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.
In addition to educational credentials, Latinos who graduate from such institutions come away with cultural capital, the formal and informal knowledge that they can use to influence their ethnic communities through their careers as newspaper editors, doctors, politicians, and the like. Thus we feel it important to ask not just about their academic achievement but also about how their college experiences shape their views of society.
Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshmen - a study of nearly 4,000 students who entered elite colleges in 1999, approximately 1,000 of whom were Latino - we first examined differences among Latinos in the sample in how much they perceived barriers to their educational and occupational opportunities. We also drew from in-depth interviews with Latino students at one of the colleges. From responses to questions about minority experience in the United States - encountering discrimination, feeling distant from white people - we identified three distinct sociopsychological profiles among Latinos: assimilation, accommodation, and resistance.
The first group (26 percent of the study sample) did not feel different from their white peers, and they saw the path to achievement as colorblind. For example, they did not think that members of minority groups faced a lot of discrimination; nor did they believe that minority students needed to earn extra credentials to compete in the job market. Because their attitudes about achievement resembled those of non-Latino students, we call them assimilationists. Were these students among the most economically privileged in the sample? Many were, but not all. A prototypical Latino in this group might be someone from a middle-class family who went to a predominantly white school and who had no qualms about achieving his or her dream.
Slightly more Latino students (32 percent) fit the pattern that we call accommodationist. Although students in this group perceived discrimination against members of minority groups, they also believed more strongly than those in the other two categories that minority students who work hard and earn educational credentials will have success in finding good jobs. These students realized that Latinos faced barriers yet had no doubt that they themselves would succeed. They may, indeed, have contrasted their opportunities with those of relatives in Latin America: The immigrant experience provided a source of optimism along with an awareness of discrimination. "I just want to take advantage of the opportunities that I have been given," one student said. "I would just be a fool to sit back and Š work in a factory."
The third group (43 percent) was the most critical of the mainstream ideology that individual effort is sufficient to get ahead. To highlight how their perceptions differed from those of the other two groups, we called these students resisters. Resisters perceived high levels of discrimination against members of minority groups and they said they felt more distant from white students than the other two groups did. Many, but not all, of these students chose a Hispanic-black racial label, and they frequently had attended high schools that were more than 70 percent minority (Latino and African-American combined).
Educators concerned with Latino achievement and with the campus climate for Latinos would do well to pay attention to these three distinct psychological profiles. Some college administrators have remarked to us that diversity programs - although clearly needed - often select people based on their ethnic category, without considering differences in perceptions about ethnicity. For example, some Latinos might feel strange about participating in a diversity program that presumed they perceived a discriminatory environment. At the same time, other Latinos might feel uncomfortable in their college setting. The important point to remember is that the ways in which individuals experience their minority status and perceive blocked opportunity vary enormously among high-achieving Latino college students.
In addition, we found strong evidence that our profiles relate to the social engagement of Latino students but not necessarily to their academic progress. Take resisters. Clearly they felt the most uncomfortable on their campuses. Yet we found that even those Latino students who were most aware of the barriers between themselves and the selective institutions they attended spent as much time on academic activities - six to seven hours a day - as the assimilators and accommodators did. Although there were some differences in the GPA's earned by members of the three groups - ranging from an average of 3.08 for the resisters to 3.13 for the assimilators, such differences were not statistically significant.
Equally striking, statistical differences appeared in a comparison of time spent on extracurricular activities. By their junior year, resisters were spending about two more hours a week in volunteer work and clubs than assimilators were. Many of the Latino students interviewed indicated that they wanted to persist in college out of a sense of obligation to ameliorate some of the disparities they perceived. As one student said, "I think that me being here can help contribute to some other person down the road."
Taken together, our results suggest that - contrary to oppositional culture theory, which posits that students will underachieve for fear of being accused of "acting white" - a strong minority identity and high perception of discrimination can be associated with high academic achievement.
It is also significant that Latino students with a strong minority identity, relative to their Latino peers at the same institutions, spend more time on extracurricular activities. That suggests that one way a Latino might be able to counteract perceived threats or hostility is by becoming part of a smaller community on the campus. At the same time, the nature of those small groups varies. Some actively recruit members by appealing to their ethnic or minority sensibilities; others adopt a colorblind approach to recruiting, emphasizing opportunities to be creative or focusing on helping others as tutors or volunteers.
Our research suggests that the issue of "fit" between a Latino student and a college campus is not only a matter of immigrant background, national origin, or socioeconomic status. Given that Latino students enter college divided into three distinct profiles, it is not surprising that they will differ in their comfort at different institutions. Not thinking about the complex ways in which students make sense of their ethnic heritage and status may lead to investing in campus resources erroneously based on stereotypes.
If the mind-set of young Latinos at elite colleges can vary as much as we have described, would we not expect the psychological profiles among those at other types of colleges to vary as well? As more Latinos enter college, we would all do well to be attuned not just to how they may be different from white, black, or Asian students, but also to what important cultural and psychological differences exist among Latinos themselves.
Although the white-Latino achievement gap still exists, Latinos are nonetheless entering the top rungs of higher education in increasing numbers. Among the elite colleges in the sample we used, student populations ranged from 1 percent to 13 percent Latino, with an average of 5 percent. In our continuing work, we hope to show how Latinos' class, regional, racial, and psychological diversity influences their educational choices and social engagement in college. We hope to contribute both to identifying factors that help explain the achievement gap between Latinos and whites, and to understanding how the college experiences of high-achieving Latinos prepare them to be cultural agents in their own communities and the nation.
Margarita Mooney is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Deborah Rivas-Drake is an assistant professor of education and human development at Brown University.
http://chronicle.com
Section: Commentary
Volume 54, Issue 29, Page A37
Copyright © 2008 by The Chronicle of Higher Education