Improving Opportunities for Southern California
Latino Youth
A Two-Year Proposal to the Texas Instruments Foundation
Katherine Larson and Russell Rumberger (UC Santa Barbara)
We believe the proposed study described below fits the objectives of the Texas Instruments Foundation and we are writing to inquire whether the Foundation would like us to submit a full proposal for consideration. The proposal is for a two-year study and we are asking the Foundation to fully fund the project for two years at $100,000 each year.
While California, and Los Angeles specifically, has set itself on a course of educational reform in recent years, the growing size and continuing underachievement of Latino students threatens the outcomes of any reform efforts. Latinos comprise nearly 60 percent of the K-12 school population in the Los Angeles basin and 40 percent of the population in the state as a whole. The educational attainment of Latinos is significantly lower than other ethnic groups both in the United States and California. In 1994, 30 percent of Latino students failed to complete high school compared to 13 percent for African Americans and 8 percent for Caucasians (McMillen & Kaufman, 1994). Nor has the school completion gap between Caucasian and Latino youth improved in the last ten years when in 1984 Hispanics were 29 percentage points behind Caucasians (Snyder & White, 1995). Most Latino youth are simply failing to achieve under current educational practices. For example, one national study found that only one-third of all Latino students scored above the 50th percentile in reading (National Center for Educational Statistics, 1996). Taken together, these statistics clearly imply that if educational achievement is to be improved in this state or in Los Angeles, it will have to include substantial gains for Latino students. This includes improving achievement at the secondary school level.
Between 1990 and 1996, a comprehensive middle school dropout prevention study, titled ALAS, was conducted to increase the educational achievement of Latino youth in Los Angeles, particularly highest-risk Latino youth. The study included 123 Latino students who were involved in the intervention and a control group of 163 highest and at-risk Latino students. The study employed a rigorous research design with random assignment. Results of the intervention were profoundly positive for enhancing educational achievement during the intervention years and one year after the intervention ended. For example, at the end of 9th grade, only 3 percent of the Latino highest-risk ALAS students had dropped out of school compared to 18 percent of the highest-risk control students.
However, the dramatic educational gains the ALAS students made fell away when the students entered Los Angeles high schools where ALAS was not being provided. There is additional evidence that participant students benefitted psychologically, socially and attitudinally from the ALAS intervention - specifically in the area of persistence and commitment to educational attainment; thereby, potentially increasing their motivation to enroll in post high school training and increasing their ability to responsibly handle adult life. If an intervention such as ALAS is found to not only dramatically improve school achievement while students are in the program but also to improve post secondary education, it is profoundly significant to educational practice in Los Angeles and California. It is important to capitalize on efforts such as ALAS that have been systematic, grounded in research and theory, and evaluated under stringent conditions. We are asking the Haynes Foundation to fund a follow-up investigation to determine the long-term impacts of the ALAS dropout program. We would further point out that long-term evaluation studies are extremely rare despite the fact that both the sociological and educational research communities consistently cite the need for such data.
Additionally, there is another component to the proposed study and another reason the study can make a singular contribution. This aspect of the proposal centers around the unique existence of a longitudinal database. That is, the 286 Latino students in the ALAS study were educationally tracked and extensively evaluated over a seven year period during grades 6th through 12th. This is the longitudinal database. At the proposed beginning date of this study, these students will have been out of high school one or two years. This is a proposal to leverage the longitudinal data by extending the study to encompass the three and four year period after high school. Thus, the proposed study would not only continue the evaluation of the effects of the ALAS dropout intervention but, as importantly, it would also provide comprehensive, heretofore unavailable data, on an urban Latino cohort of students. In terms of the longitudinal follow-up we propose to identify which student characteristics and educational experiences in grades 6th - 12th predict post high school outcomes for urban Latino youth. We would investigate "socially significant" outcomes such as propensity for further education and training, employment, teen pregnancy and family formation, crime and alcohol and substance abuse. These data would identify for educators particular risk factors in secondary students in order that educators can target specific students for focused interventions and these data would provide educators with knowledge about how particular educational experiences such as transferring high schools, enrolling in magnet programs, and participation in alternative education, influence post secondary outcomes - both positively and negatively.
In summary, the proposed study would provide knowledge from data only uniquely available from an existing database, about how to increase educational achievement of Latino youth and how schools can better prepare Latino youth for adult life. We propose to complete the study in two years. Activities will include analyzing previously collected raw data as well as collecting and analyzing data from follow-up interviews and assessments.
