Long Beach, Calif.
When Harry Pachón’s brother asked him which college he would attend after high school, Pachón said he thought colleges would get in touch with him. Dr. Pachón, now president of the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute, said his anecdote illustrated that lack of information should not be confused with lack of ability.
This sentiment echoed throughout the TRPI conference on Latino college access held late last week and was well received by the more than 600 scholars, students, administrators and education experts in attendance.
Some of the barriers to college access speakers identified included lack of access to information about college admissions, financial aid and scholarships, as well as parental inexperience with the college application process. Overshadowing all of these challenges, however, was the specter of socioeconomic disadvantage.
Patricia Pérez, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of California, Los Angeles, noted that, on average, only 10 percent of Latinos who enroll in college complete their bachelor’s degree. Pérez and her colleagues at UCLA’s Higher Education Research Institute (HERI) found that many students go to college with a lack of “self efficacy or academic competency, financial constraints, and extra-familial or work obligations.” According to Dr. Victor Saenz, also of the Institute, some of the factors that mitigate these negative trends include parental encouragement, more Latinos/as on campus, and access to religious activities, particularly for men.
According to Dr. Lisa Chavez of the Center for Latino Policy Research at UC- Berkeley, 87 percent of Latinos who entered a California community college in 1996 did not transfer to a four-year college nor did they earn an associate degree in six years.
