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Latino MIAs: They're missing in academia

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Maria Paulina Duarte has friends whose shadows will never darken a college doorway.

Pregnancies and marriages.

Jobs right out of high school, or even the inability to complete high school.

Parents who haven’t gone to school themselves and therefore don’t see the need for higher education.

Paltry financial resources.

And, sometimes, immigration status.

They all play a role. But the other common thread is that they are all Latino, a community with many cultural and socioeconomic undercurrents that prevent students from going on to college.

It’s a problem that officials at The University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire know only too well. The story is in the numbers. Only about one percent of UW- Eau Claire’s student population is Latino, although Latinos comprise 4.5% of Wisconsin’s population and 14.4% of the nation’s.

A junior majoring in biology at UW-Eau Claire, Duarte, 20, is the first in her family to attend college. Born in Durango, Mexico, she was raised in Delavan.

“Without financial aid I would not be here in school,” she said. “My grades would not be as good because I'd have to get extra work, and work probably a full-time job. So it would be harder to keep going. More stress would build up."

Students like Duarte are highly sought after. But getting them to school presents particular problems, said Stephanie Zighelboim, the student services coordinator at the campus’ Office of Multicultural Affairs.

“The Latino student has his own character,” said Zighelboim, who comes from Venezuelan roots herself.

Events such as the university’s annual Chili Feed and leadership retreats help but the chili event, she said, often is just reinforcing a decision that has already been made. It takes the personal touch to attract Latino students. And that requires one-on-one attention and talking to parents.

The aim is to “demystify the college experience and sometimes convincing parents that their child will “not come back a gringo,” Zighelboim said.

“With the Latino culture and their often tightly-knit families, it can be difficult for the parents to see their children leave,” she added.

Like Duarte, the students are often first generation college-goers whose own parents have had little to no education.

Money plays a big role in whether Latino students can come to college. Latino families are often struggling to make ends meet and require the older children to stay near so that they may contribute.

There are resources to help students financially. For instance, Zighelboim said, if they are in the upper quarter of their class academically and score 26 or more on the ACTs, they are eligible for $6,000 in aid.

“There is the national Hispanic College Fund. It's simply false that resources aren't available to help Latino students,” she said. Zighelboim’s job is to get that information to the students and the parents.

All of these factors are familiar to both Duarte and to Megan Lafontaine, 21, a senior majoring in communications at UW-Eau Claire.

“Family ties are a huge part of it,” said Lafontaine. “If your parents … think, ‘well I didn't go to college and I got a job. Why do you have to go?’ I know how that is.”

While she didn’t experience this personally, she said she has met Latinos who have. Lafontaine was adopted as a child from Chile and raised in Eau Claire. Her father has a college degree and her older brother is a lawyer. Education was always stressed in her home. Even so, like Duarte, she said she would find it extremely difficult to attend college without financial aid.

UW-Eau Claire students pay up to $10,648 a year in tuition, housing and fees.

But another serious problem for the Latino community is the matter of immigration status.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that public education, kindergarten through 12th grade, is a right for all U.S. children, regardless of immigration status. However, students who graduate from high school and who are not legal residents suddenly find themselves shut out of college.

Because these students are illegal immigrants, most states require that they pay inflated out-of-state tuition. The absence of financial aid, because it is generally reserved for citizens or legal residents, then makes college unattainable.

The Dream Act is intended to help these students. Some 65,000 immigrant students would qualify for help under the Act, say the legislation's authors. The bill - formally called the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act - would eliminate federal rules that discourage states from providing cheaper in-state tuition and would allow students who have grown up in the United States to apply for legal status after college graduation, military service or other community service.

Congress failed to approve the measure in its last session. It has been reintroduced in the current Congress by Senators, Richard Durbin, D-Ill., and Orrin Hatch, R-Utah.

Zighelboim told why she struggles to increase the Latino student population.

“These individuals are not numbers but people,” she said. As such, they are deserving of opportunity.

UW-Eau Claire views itself as a regional university, and recruits mainly from Wisconsin and Minnesota. Most of the school’s Latinos come from the Milwaukee area, where the Latino population in Wisconsin is most concentrated.

Getting to school is one problem. Fitting in once Latinos get here is another.

The relatively few Latinos on campus have formed a community to promote and support cultural, social, and academic interaction among Latinos and others. One such group is SOL, Student Organization of Latinos and Latinas.

“The Latinos who are here have developed a close relationship.... We've gotten to know each other and (have) developed a close-knit bond," Lafonataine said.

Zighelboim has some advice for those who view Latino recruitment as just another form of affirmative action, undeserving of official effort.

“An educated Latino is a Latino who is going to give back to the community," she said.

Judging from her plans, Duarte has the same belief. “I plan to go to medical school or optometry school to be an eye doctor. … Maybe go back to Mexico and have my own clinic and help out people who aren't as privileged as we are."

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