Information from the California State Universities released last month stated that Fullerton College enrolls the most Latino students transferring to their campuses.
The total number of Latino transfer students during the 2012-2013 year was 443, a 5 percent increase from last year.
FC President Rajen Vurdien stated that the college is working very hard to help every student succeed, specifically for Latinos because there is a significant difference between the various ethnicities and their transfer percentages. Latinos are still not ranking at the same level as Asian-Americans or Caucasians.
“The faculty and staff are dedicated because they too want to see the students succeed,” said Vurdien. “We work together to help students do better.”
He also stated how the campus has a wide range of resources such as the Cadena Transfer Center, the Puente Program and the Transfer Achievement Program. Students must do their part as well to ensure their success and progress.
“If you make the conscience decision to come to college, then you have to do your part to make it happen,” said Vurdien. “We can’t do everything for you.”
CSU Fullerton which is the closest Cal State to FC is considered number one amongst FC transfer students. It is also number four in the state for the total number of CSU transfers.
Examining ethnic diversity on a larger scale within universities and college’s across the nation, U.S. News released information regarding the diversity index of schools from 2012-2013 year. The scales ranged from 0-1, the closer a school was to 1 the more diverse it was.
For national universities, 10 Californian schools were in the top 25 with indexes ranging from 0.74 to 0.67; Stanford University, University of San Francisco, UCLA, UC Riverside, University of the Pacific, San Diego State University, UC Davis, UC Santa Cruz, UC Berkeley, and UC Santa Barbara.
California schools also had 10 of the top 25 liberal arts colleges. The first was Pine Union College with a 0.76 Diversity Index to the last being Scripps College with a 0.54 DI.
Although this is a great accomplishment for the Latino community and the college, Latinos seem to struggle the most in regards to graduating with a degree. Roughly 11 percent of Latinos at age of 25 or older earned their bachelor’s degree which makes it the one with the least success from the rest of the ethnic groups in finishing college.
Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders are at 48 percent, Caucasions are at 39 percent, and African-Americans at 23 percent. This information is provided by census reports regarding education at the state and federal levels and by California’s higher educational systems.
The biggest improvement in education within the Latino community is earning a high school diploma which increased 23 percent from 1990 to 2011.
In the CSUs Latinos as incoming freshmen made up 14 percent of the students and only 5 percent at the UC campuses.
Roberto Suro, the director of Tomas Rivera Public Policy Institute at the University of Southern California, stated that students from Latino households tend to have socioeconomic obstacles along their road. They vary from having to take up a part-time or even full-time jobs to support themselves or their family, coming from a low-income household or one rooted in poverty and being first generation college students.
“They show that it’s not just preparation per se that is driving students’ college-decision making. There are a lot of other factors, from issues of cost and accessibility to state colleges limiting enrollment due to budget cuts,” said Lindsey Malcom-Piqueux, from the Center for Urban Education at USC.
She talked about why a significant amount of Latino students attend community college instead of four-year institutions.
Latino students aren’t only hitting the books but fighting for a bigger cause which is tied to their socioeconomic circumstances. That cause is immigration reform.
On Oct 4. M.E.Ch.A. co-chair, Guadalupe Cisneros and Ricardo Muniz, a member of the Fullerton College Dream Team alongside others rallied outside Ed Royce’s office in hopes of having their voices heard.
They asked Royce to support the Immigration Reform. The crowd shared stories on why it is important to them, but did not succeed in getting a hold of Royce directly.