California's Impending College Graduate Crisis and What Needs to Be Done about It. Policy Brief 10-2

Policy Analysis for California Education, PACE. 3653 Tolman Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720-1670. Tel: 510-642-7223; Fax: 510-642-9148; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http://pace.berkeley.edu

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16

William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
James Irvine Foundation

College Attendance; College Graduates; Access to Education; Hispanic American Students; Developmental Studies Programs; Educational Policy; Politics of Education; Change Strategies; Educational Change; High School Graduates; Graduation Rate; Academic Persistence; Enrollment Management; Policy Analysis

California; Texas

In 2005-06 almost half of the pupils in California's public schools were Latinos, but Latinos only received about 15 percent of the BA degrees awarded by public and private colleges in the state. Texas has a comparable Latino population, but does significantly better than California in getting Latino students through college. The implication of this disparity is that California stands to produce too few graduates to fuel its cutting-edge high tech and high-end service economy. In this policy brief, the author explores the reasons why California's education system falls short in ensuring post-secondary access and success for Latino students, and identifies six steps that the state could take to increase the number of four-year college graduates: (1) California middle and high schools should get financial incentives to identify potential college-bound Latino (and African-American) students and mentor them into college attendance; (2) The state should consider expanding its current University of California guarantee to the top academic four percent of seniors to Texas's norm of ten percent; (3) College counseling in California high schools has to be reorganized and strengthened, so that well trained counseling staffs can encourage minority students to choose college prep courses, and match students to colleges and funding opportunities; (4) California has to go beyond policies that greatly expanded access to community college education to policies that improve completion and transfer rates in CCCs; (5) State universities should be rewarded for identifying and supporting potential lower income minority applicants in high school; and (6) Colleges should also get financial help for providing remedial courses if necessary, and help in mentoring students in need of remediation through college to degrees. (Contains 3 tables, 8 figures and 8 endnotes.)

ERIC

17

2010

ED510163