More Blacks Go to College; Rate for Latinos Falls : Education: Total of minorities on campus grows, but the gap with whites closes only slightly, a study will show today.
The number of black students enrolling in college has risen slightly over the last five years but the rate for Latino students is in a persistent and worrisome decline, the American Council on Education will report today.
The number of minority students attending college grew in the second half of the 1980s, but the gap between the percentage of whites and the minority population closed only slightly, the council said in its 10th annual report on minorities in higher education.
In 1985, 34.4% of white high school graduates aged 18 through 24 went on to college, contrasted to 26.1% for blacks. Five years later, those percentages were 39.4% and 33%, respectively.
During the same period, the percentage of Latino high school graduates entering college showed virtually no increase, remaining at 29%, the report said.
Robert Atwell, president of the American Council on Education, termed the figures for Latinos “abysmal,” and his sentiment was echoed by Latino groups.
“The numbers are no surprise to us,” said Lisa Navarrete, public information director of the National Council of La Raza, a Latino rights group. “The education system has failed the Hispanic community. To change these trends, schools must begin tailoring programs to fit the needs of Hispanic students.”
The report linked poor high school completion rates among Latinos with the declining college enrollment figures. In 1985, 16.9% of 18- through 24-year-old Latinos--both with high school diplomas and without--enrolled in college. By 1990 that figure had fallen to 15.8%. During the same five-year period, high school graduation rates for Latino youths dropped from 62.9% to 54.5%.
In contrast, while only 15.8% of young Latinos entered college in 1990, 32.5% of whites and 25.4% of blacks of a similar age enrolled that year.
The reasons offered for the disappointing rate of Latino college enrollment varied. Blandina C. Ramirez, director of the office of minorities in higher education for the Council on Education, said last week that Latinos, as the fastest-growing minority in the United States, had several inherent disadvantages in achieving educational parity.
In general, Ramirez said, Latinos live in the most segregated neighborhoods, have fewer educational resources and confront language and cultural barriers. They are also the least likely minority group to participate in preschool programs or to complete the 11th and 12th grades--two ends of the educational process that experts say are particularly important for those who go to college.
“Many (Latinos) are very likely to leave school after attaining the mandatory age of attendance and after having had very bad educational experiences,” Ramirez said.
For blacks, the report contained the first positive findings in years. Black men posted their highest high school completion rate in 1990--75.9%, up from 72.2% in 1989. Reversing a generally downward trend of the previous eight years, black men made a strong showing during 1988-90, with a 7.4% gain in college enrollment to 476,000. Black women did even better. Their numbers rose to 747,000, an 8.7% increase.
Estimates of high school completion and college enrollment were not available for American Indians and Asian Americans.
As total educational employment rose over the last 10 to 15 years, so did the number of minority faculty. But, as with other findings, minorities’ share of jobs changed insignificantly.
For instance, blacks made up 4.5% of full-time faculty, but nearly half of them, 47.7%, were teaching at historically black colleges.
Mary Dillworth, a spokeswoman for the American Assn. of Colleges for Teacher Education in Washington, said that the improvement in minority enrollment is tied to increasing the numbers of minority teachers.
“We need more minority teachers . . . but we also need more majority teachers who know how to teach minority students. If we don’t, we’re in big trouble,” Dillworth said. “We know that students try to stay (in school) where they feel comfortable. And minority students feel comfortable when they see a cadre of (minority) teachers.”
The report said that Asian Americans nearly doubled their enrollment in higher education during the last decade, in large part because of steady growth in the Asian American population in the United States for the last 15 years. Figures for 1988-90 show an enrollment increase of 11.7%, which the report suggested may indicate a somewhat slower growth in the future.
Council on Education President Atwell made it clear that the advances pointed out in the report were “small, very small” and came after years of “unrelenting gloomy findings.”
“We would be wrong to look at the numbers, see progress and conclude that recruitment and retention programs on behalf of underserved groups are no longer necessary,” he said. “We made that mistake in the late 1970s, and we have been struggling ever since to regain those lost advances.”
Nor was the report optimistic that the positive trends will continue next year. The effects of the recession, cutbacks in state financial support, higher admission standards and enrollment caps “threaten to undo much of the progress of the late 1980s at the very time when minorities need to consolidate their gains.”
Mixed Results for Minorities
Blacks, in the 18-to-24-year-old age group, have made slight gains since 1985 in college enrollment. But gains by Latinos have been unsteady and have been below 30% in the last two years. Chart shows the percentage of 18- through 24-year-olds entering college for each group:
White Black Latino 1980 31.8% 27.6% 29.8% 1981 32.5 28.0 29.9 1982 31.1 28.0 29.2 1983 32.9 27.0 31.4 1984 33.7 27.2 29.9 1985 34.4 26.1 26.9 1986 34.5 29.1 30.4 1987 36.6 30.0 28.5 1988 38.1 28.1 30.9 1989 38.8 30.8 26.7 1990 39.4 33.0 29.0
Source: American Council on Education
