Failure to educate a fast-growing segment of the U.S. work force — Latino males — may put the country at a global economic disadvantage, experts say.

MIchigan Technological University graduate Andy Puble, who now works as an engineer for Caterpillar, worked 40 hours a week while taking a full course load.

One expert calls it “a silent crisis.” Latino males are more likely to drop out of high school and are more likely not to fi nish college. While the number of Latino males enrolled in colleges and universities has increased in the last 20 years, it has not kept pace with that of other ethnic groups. In addition, the gap between the number of male and female Hispanics on the nation’s campuses has widened. Although this last fact is true for all racial and ethnic groups, it is particularly acute among Hispanics.

Of the 1.3 million Latinos on campus, 57 percent are female, according to the Pew Hispanic Center. While Hispanic males make up about 8 percent of the U.S. population, they account for only about 4 percent of the nation’s college and university enrollment.

Experts say the number of Americans of Hispanic descent is growing at a rate four times faster than that of the rest of the nation. Hispanics make up 15 percent of the U.S. population, a fi gure that is expected to double in 40 years. Hispanics also tend to be younger and are more likely to enter the labor force than the rest of the population in general.

So the paucity of Hispanic males in college, they say, could ultimately have dire economic implications for the nation and for its competitiveness in areas like technology transfer, engineering, medicine and applied science.

“One of every three people entering the work force is Hispanic,” says Dr. John Moder, senior vice president for the Hispanic Association for Colleges and Universities, a San Antonio-based organization that represents more than 400 institutions of higher learning focused on Hispanic education. “The projection is that by 2020 that number will be one of two. By coming from a group that is underrepresented in higher education, we’re going to have a hard time finding the workers you need for an educated work force. We’re going to have a hard time competing in the global marketplace. The jobs of the present, and even more so the jobs of the future, are the kinds of jobs that require higher education. That’s precisely the area where we need to be developing human talent.”