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Proyecto Visión 21

A call to action against the “de-culturalization” of our children

Last Friday, October 30, 2009, I had the privilege of attending the 18th Annual “Bernie Valdez” Awards Luncheon, organized by the Latin American Research and Service Agency (LARASA) to recognize outstanding Hispanic personalities in Colorado and those of any origin who tirelessly work for the benefit of our community.

LARASA, founded 45 years ago by Valdez and others, was the first Hispanic 501(c)3 nonprofit organization in the country, created to help Mexican-American students who wanted to go to college.

There was such a need at that time to help those students that it is said that Valdez and other selfish Hispanic leaders went door to door in Denver asking for a dime to eventually have enough money to pay for the college studies of deserving Latino students who otherwise could not afford those studies.

Almost half a century ago, when Valdez and his supporters went to the community looking for a way to help Hispanic students, the dropout rate among Hispanics in Denver was very high, and the number of Latinos going to college was very low. Even fewer Latinos graduated from college.

However, a very important change has happened since the time of Bernie Valdez. Today, Latinos are no longer an insignificant minority at school. In fact, in many districts, Latinos are an important segment of the student body and in many other districts, Denver included, the majority of the students are Latino.

Fifty years ago, if a high percentage of Hispanics decided to drop out of schools, that was not –from a strict statistical and administrative point of view- a major issue.

Today we still have the same high percentage of school dropouts among Latino students. However, the problem has now grown almost exponentially, because Hispanics are no longer a small minority easy to ignore or overlook.

In other words, our children are facing what I describe as a process of “double de-culturalization.” First, many of them do not graduate from high school. Second, even if they do not graduate, whatever they learned was enough in many cases to lead them away from their roots and family traditions.

According to a report published last week by the Donnell-Kay Foundation in Denver, schools are failing, not the Latino students, because schools have not adapted to the new demographic reality in their classrooms and to the educational and cultural needs of Hispanic students.

The report suggest schools should offer more than one “pathway to graduation” and even flexible schedules to accommodate the needs and responsibilities (work, family) of the new generations of students.

Why schools have not adapted? There are many reasons, among them the silence of Latino parents. For example, in a suburb north of Denver, where 68 percent of students are Hispanic, only 2 percent of parents at parents-teacher meetings are Latino.

With inspirational examples such as Valdez and many others, it is time to speak firmly and respectfully, not only with words, but also with wise actions. After all, we are talking about our very own children.

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