Posted on November 30, 2011

New Study on Hispanic Achievement Paints Stark Picture

Lesli Maxwell, Education Week, November 29, 2011

A brand-new study examining the nation’s fastest-growing population of students–Hispanics–is out today, and the findings are pretty bleak.

The Council of the Great City Schools has just published “Today’s Promise, Tomorrow’s Future: The Social and Educational Factors Contributing to the Outcomes of Hispanics in Urban Schools,” which takes a close look at how Hispanic students in urban school systems are faring compared with their white peers nationally.

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Among the key findings, according to researchers with the council:

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•On the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), Hispanic and ELL proficiency rates in reading from 2003 to 2009 were at least 26 percentage points below the rates for white students in 4th grade and 24 percentage points below white students’ in 8th grade. For math in those same years, the proportion of Hispanic students performing at or above “proficient” was at least 29 percentage points lower than for white students in 4th grade and 26 points lower in 8th grade.

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•Hispanic students in 2008 were much more at risk of dropping out than their white and black peers: 2 1/2 times more likely to drop out than white students and almost twice as likely as black students. And in 2010, fewer than two out of 10 Hispanic students took an Advanced Placement exam compared with six out of 10 white students.

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[Editor’s Note: The full report is available here.]