The Santa Fe New Mexican reports on minority achievement levels in schools.
A new study of how Santa Fe students scored on a state standardized test confirms what local educators know and what national studies show.
Hispanic students score lower than Anglos at all grades and in all subjects. But what hasn’t been apparent until now is that the gap continues to show up when poverty and language are discounted….
Sandra Rodriguez, an education professor at the College of Santa Fe, drew similar conclusions in a published dissertation based on her study of eight students in Española Public Schools in the late 1990s.
“Damn it, it’s true. People say it’s poverty, but it’s not. People say it’s language, but it’s not,” she said.
Rodriguez has another idea. Native New Mexico Hispanics, she said, tend to distrust the education system because of bad experiences of their relatives, and that could explain the gap in motivation….
Gwen Perea, a bilingual teacher at Nava Elementary School, said that the most important factor in success of her students — more than money or divorce — is parental involvement. [emphasis added]