PROBLEM SOLUTION ESSAY

Hispanics are not treated equally in schools, which prevents them to achieve the American
Dream.
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The Hispanic population is expanding fast in the United States. Hispanic parents immigrate

to this country to seek better opportunities, not only for them but for their children´s future. They

are known as hardworking people, so to achieve their dreams many families make great sacrifices

like working in low-wage jobs. One of the main goals of parents to achieve the American Dream

is offering a good education to their children. In recent years Hispanic students have topped the

charts at the educational level, but rather not for something good, but for the high percentage of

failures and school dropouts. One of the main reasons for these school dropouts and failures is due

to the discrimination that these young people receive in schools, where they do not feel valued. I

think they should be seen and accepted as other groups are. It is a serious issue that Hispanics are

not treated equally in schools, for this reason, it is more difficult for them to achieve the American

dream; in order to do this, the educational system of the United States needs to be reformed, and

needs to establish connections and better relationships between teachers and Hispanic students.

Hispanics are not treated equally in schools, which prevents them from achieving the

American dream. No one is more affected than the Hispanics themselves because if they are not

treated equally in schools, which is the foundation of their future, how are they going to be able to

achieve something higher in life? In these times, the most valuable thing a person can have is

education and a university degree. Without this, they are forced to work anywhere and receive low

wages for life because they need a livelihood for themselves and their families. In addition, the

United States will be affected as a country because Latino population is increasing more and more,

so it means that this minority population can be the largest minority population in the country. For

this reason, people from the government should be more interested in changing the education for

Hispanics; if they do not care about the Latinos themselves, it is fine, but at least they should do

something for the future of their own country. As mentioned before, discrimination is one of the

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main causes why Hispanics students are dropping out schools. According to Tenenbaum and Ruck

(2007) in the Journal Negotiating the American Dream: Paradox…they stated that teachers

compliment Latino students less, regardless of right responses, they also punish them for not

having good English fluency (p.98). This shows that Hispanic students are not treated the same as

others within the classroom. In addition, according to the same article, Hill, Tyson and Bromell

(2009), claimed that teachers refer to Hispanic students in a wrong way; they refer to them as

“Mexican students” (p.98).As seen, these kind of expressions describing a person or a group of

people within classrooms are not acceptable. It is also less acceptable coming from teachers, who

are supposed to give example of good behavior. Another cause of dropout rates is the language

barrier. As cited in the Journal Hispanic high school dropouts: their unheard voices.., in 2007 the

Pew Hispanic Center reported that “59% of Hispanics who dropped out school spoke little

English”(p.32). Consequently, because of systematic discriminatory acts, and student’s language

barrier; Hispanic students continue to have the highest high school dropout rate. Statistics show

that the percentage of Latinos dropping schools is alarming. According to the article Negotiating

the American Dream...“Only 64% of Latino 18-24 years olds have completed high school”. (U.S

Department of Commerce, 2000) (p. 96). This statistic shows the high percentage of Hispanics

that have not finished school. It is evident that the language barrier, and discriminatory acts

represents a serious problem for Hispanic students, as are ones of the main causes for them to leave

the schools.

In order to solve this problem, it is necessary to reform the education system of the United

States and create a link between teachers and students. By changing the education system, a plan

about including Hispanics can change the way they feel. In addition, parental involvement is

important and teachers should be involved in this process as well. If teachers, parents, and students

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get along a trusting environment can be created. In this way, Hispanics students would feel more

comfortable. According to Ann Molina (2015), about 20 years of research have shown that the

relationship between teachers and students is vital, mostly for Hispanic students. Students need

teachers that inspire and trust in them; in this way, students can achieve their goals; they need

teachers who are really interested in them and help them to get ahead (p.90). This solution is

realistic and viable because building a link between teachers and students is the foundation of the

educational system, and the solution for Hispanic students to feel valued. In addition, this solution

is cost-effective and feasible to implement because anyway, the government needs to hire teachers,

so it would be a good idea to hire teachers who can speak Spanish. With this ability, the relationship

between teachers and students would be improved. It has been shown through studies that building

a link between teachers and students is important, and the percentage of dropouts is due to the

language problem. According to the journal Hispanic youth dropping out of U.S. Schools:

Measuring the challenge. ,“ the percentage of Latino high schools dropouts is 40%, these include

people who are recently immigrated and they have never attended U.S. schools, and they do not

have abilities speaking English, not even basic English” (Fry, 2003). In addition, the relationship

among teachers and students is essential. According to the journal Hispanic High School

Dropouts: Their Unheard Voices some students claimed that due to the lack of interest of their

teachers, they found it difficult to be successful in academic work. This was shown in 2006 data

made by a city´s Youth Transitions Task Force (Molina, 2015). This is why this solution is the

best. As mentioned before, building a link between teachers and students is the foundation of the

educational system and hiring teachers with Spanish abilities is a plus for Hispanic students to

develop a good communication with their teachers and feel valued.

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However, once the solution is proposed, there are a group of people who argues that

Hispanic students are not doing their best effort. They say that Asian students are doing well in

school compare to Hispanics; both a minority groups. They say that it does not matter being a

minority, everyone can do well in school. According to the blog Why Don´t Latinos Do As Well in

School? (2015), Laurence Steinberg, a psychology professor at Temple University in Philadelphia

claimed that there are four factors that cannot be controlled by teachers and schools and why

Hispanics do not do well in school, they are: parental expectation, bad influences, being diligent

instead of natural ability, and they do not look forward to the future. (paras. 16-22). Steinberg also

said “If you have these four things, it does not matter what ethnic group you’re from, you’ll do

well in school,” With this last quote their whole point was that there is no excuses for any minority

group to fail in school, everything depends on the person and the desire to fight and move forward.

Although the opponents mentioned some points that get out of the hands of teachers and

schools; there is one important point that schools can improve; “Parental outreach”. Parental

outreach is the process in which parents get involved in all experiences both academically and

providing emotional support when their children need it. However, parents are not the only ones

who should show interest in getting involved in this whole process. As a school, all the staff should

be on the lookout for each student, so that when teachers notice failures in their student´s grades,

they could immediately call parents and discuss it. In this way, dropouts can be prevented, and

also school could create a stronger relationship between parents, students, and professors. To

illustrate it, according to the Journal The relationship between parental involvement and Urban

Secondary School Student Academic Achievement, some educators have strongly pointed to

parental outreach as the main way by which to increase academic achievement from low levels

(e.g., Hara, 1998, pag. 82). This is why parental involvement must be a priority for all schools. In

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addition, Parental outreach has been an important topic in the last years. In (2007) Jaynes claimed

that “Social scientists are giving parental involvement a special place of importance in influencing

the academic outcomes of the youth”. The same story has been repeating in many schools. In 2003

Hein said that many Hispanic parents had the opportunity to get involved with teachers in their

children's schools but they felt rejected. This is the way how many school directors run their

centers. That is why although many people say that the students have their faults, it is not always

true. The educational system must face and accept its mistakes. As schools are not doing their job,

they must involve parents in their children's process. Education is not something simple, it requires

a lot of work from many people.

The Government of the United States should invest more in Hispanic education. Most

Hispanics will not be able to achieve the American Dream because of the problems they are facing

with education. This problem is due to the dropouts of schools, and it is because they are not treated

equally in schools. The principal cause is “Discrimination”. They need to help students progress

at the beginning of their path. This is important, not because I said it, but because surveys and

statistics have shown that Hispanics are the next generation of this country. That means if they do

not care about the education issue in the future, this country will be full of people with no

education. Consequently, people with no education tend to be involved in crime, unwanted

pregnancy, and so many other situations that do not contribute at all to the development of a

country. In addition, with this educational problem, if they cannot make it in schools they will not

be able to aspire to great things in the future. A single person cannot make the school dropouts

decrease. This should be a team-effort among government, school staff, teachers, students, parents,

and the community. It is not just to help a minority group, but to guarantee the future of the country.

Now, do you think it is important to invest in Hispanics education?

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References

Fashola, O, and Robert Slavin (1997). Effective dropout prevention and college attendance

programs for Latino students. 42p.; Paper presented at the. Annual Meeting of the

American Educational Research Association (Chicago).

Fry, R. (2003). Hispanic youth dropping out of U.S. Schools: Measuring the challenge. ERIC-

Institution of Education Sciences.

Hispanic Pundit Archives (2015). Blog, “Why don´t Latinos do as well in school”.

http://hispanicpundit.com/2005/10/21/why-dont-latinos-do-as-well-in-school/

Hill, N., & Torres, K. (2010). “Negotiating the American Dream: The Paradox of Aspirations and

Achievement among Latino Students and Engagement between their Families and

Schools”. Journal of Social Issues, Vol. 66, No. 1, 2010, pp. 95—112.

Jeynes, W. (2007). The relationship between parental involvement and urban secondary school

student academic achievement. Volume 42 Number 1 January 2007 82-110.

Molina, C. (2015). “Hispanic high school dropouts: their unheard voices”. Journal dissertations

and doctoral studies collection.

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