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Mayra Fernandez
Professor Presnell
English 1103 Honors
1 December 2011
No Child Left Behind?
America has long been the land of opportunities, and for many Hispanics with dreams of
a prospering future for their children and future generations, Americas streets are indeed
made of gold. As a Hispanic student in college, I can be evidence of an American dream in
progress. My parents both immigrated to the United States: my father, fleeing the communist
regime of Fidel Castro in Cuba, and my mother desperately escaping the poverty of the
Dominican Republic. They pushed me to no end as a little girl academically, wanting me to set
goals for myself so that their coming here to America was not in vain. My parents encouraged
me to be self-motivated and self-driven. To use my past, as well as theirs, as motivation to keep
moving forward. However, there are Hispanic students in the United States that everyday feel
they are a burden to society. Many of them are labeled, and mislabeled, as kids with no drive or
motivation, no thirst for knowledge, no future. Many of them are stereotyped as ESL failures.
As a Latina, I feel for the future of my people. I ask myself: who will care to acknowledge the
true potential of these students that are constantly left behind? And then will they care to do
something about it?
Digging for Gold: The Unfortunate Economic Reality
For the past ten years, Hispanic Americans and Hispanic immigrants are known as
incredibly hard working people. So much so, we have been closely labeled in comparison with

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mules. A heart-breaking paradox: hard work is undermined and underpaid. The children of
Hispanic immigrants that were born in the United States (first generation students) are often
the ones that are mostly affected by the economic standards of their parents. The Pew Hispanic
Center noted that in 2008, these first generation students accounted for 84% of the Hispanic
student population in public schools research (Fry).
Various forms of research connect economic well-being to a bright, successful academic
future, and vice versa. It makes perfect sense: money buys resources. In the case of Hispanic
Americans, however, lack of funds not only hinders financial stability but also a childs success
academically (Hing). Usually, parents of first generation Latinos work jobs that no one wants. Is
that a stereotype? Yes. Is it true for the most part? Unfortunately. How I see it is that its not
the current economic status of the parents that affect a students academic success, but the
support that student has. And if that student does not have access to an elite private school,
support from their parents can do so much more. When interviewing my older sister, Amelia
Castro, who is a legal assistant in New Jersey, she mentioned that although she did not grow up
with much, she realizes that it was the support from her parents that encouraged her to want a
better future for herself and that the key to that success is education (Castro).
A Colorful Prism: The Multidimensional Identity of Hispanic Youth
American society in general does not seem to get what we are or where the hell we
come from. I believe that in order for the American public school system to start to fully
acknowledge the much potential of Hispanic students America as a society needs to accept us
as Americans. By that I mean this: Whenever I have to fill out a form identifying my

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race/ethnicity, I have to bubble in Multi-Racial along with Hispanic as my ethnicity. Basically, I

am an African-American and White girl whose parents are from Spanish-speaking countries.
Aldo Figallo, a half Peruvian and half Italian American from Charlotte, North Carolina, briefly
described her experience growing up Hispanic as a bit frustrating. She says, My parents left us
at home with an older couple while they were away for a couple of days when we were young
teenagers. They kept feeding us chili, tacos and such. One day, the lady asked us what was in a
burrito, and finally one of my siblings said You know we are not Mexican don't you? We
understood that she was trying her best (Figallo).
In comparison to his/her non-Hispanic counterpart, a Hispanic student has two or more
cultural identities. These multiple cultural identities often conflict with how that student may
view him/herself in society. Robert Jimenezs article It's a Difference That Changes Us: An
Alternative View of the Language and Literacy Learning of Latina/o Students discusses how the
identity of a Hispanic student affects their literacy. The author believes that American schools
do not offer the literacy needed in order to satisfy students of culturally and linguistically
diverse communities (Jimenez). Interestingly enough, Jimenez continues to state later on in
the article that one of the reasons behind the lack of academic achievement in many Hispanic
students is that educators simply do not have an understanding of the diversity among the term
Hispanic. I myself find that in disregarding the ethnicity or cultural background of a student, a
teacher inadvertently disregards the importance of literacy, in all of its definitions, to that
particular student. Even using general, or umbrella terms such as Latino/a hinder the reality
and identity of a Hispanic student because it does not properly define the complexity behind
he/her identity (Jimenez). Jimenez says, This fundamental aspect of one's identity, ignored so

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often in classrooms as too incendiary and volatile a subject for discussion, has a huge influence
on the types of schooling available to students, their later educational opportunities, and even
their career possibilities.
Based on my personal experiences as a Hispanic-American student, I find that I have to
work harder in terms of my education than other students of say a Caucasian background due
to various obstacles that almost always appear in my way. For example, I never could, and
probably never can, ask my parents to help me with my English homework (asking for help with
spelling, grammar, or writing papers). I have to make sure that my proficiency in the English
language does not overshadow, or become more superior, to that of the Spanish language. I
believe that many Hispanic students can relate to the fact that we have the responsibility of
being literate in both English and Spanish to prepare for the job market and, most importantly,
for the sake of persevering our culture.
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Bilingualism
If only I had a dollar for every time I heard a teacher say how important it is to know
another language besides English. I would be filthy rich. However, why is it that Hispanic
students, who a majority (unlike what most people think) speak both English and Spanish
fluently, are not all given the chance to perfect this advantage that they have? Instead, the
fact that English is not the first language spoken places an academic hindrance, even for those
students that have learned to speak English fluently well before they reach high school.
I interviewed my cousin Lucilina Nuez who is 20 years old and was born in the
Dominican Republic and raised in the United States. Spanish was her first language and was the

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language primarily spoken in her home. One of the questions I asked her was, Is being
bilingual honestly a GREAT thing? Her response was Yes, so I continued with, then why do
you think Hispanic students are not taught to enhance this skill, for example, taking Spanish for
native speaker classes? She said that in her opinion, Hispanic students often times are told
that it is best to select another language other than Spanish, such as French. If they do get into
Spanish classes, they get bored and end up getting an A in the class without even trying
(Nuez). I am sure that many other Hispanic students can attest to this observation. I think that
some educators make the assumption that because a child knows another language besides
English it would be in the childs best interest to learn yet another language. Somehow, it levels
the playing field for students who only speak English and are learning another language and
students who speak English and another language (most likely a native language spoken at
home). Is this fair?
The White Mans Current Burden?
The 2010 United States Census states that there are 50.5 million Hispanics in the nation,
thats approximately 16% of the entire population (United States). There is power in numbers:
Hispanics have an overwhelming influence in the economy, politics, and American culture. And
if this is the case, it only makes sense that as a nation, we strive to educate and nurture what
will be the future of our country. Hispanic students in public high schools across America should
be given many more opportunities to succeed than they are given now. Yet, we are constantly
misunderstood and misguided by our peers, society, and even our teachers. It leads me to
wonder do we matter at all. Are we polluting America with our language, accents, and cultures?

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Are Hispanics the new blacks, Jews, and gays of America? Are we at the top of every patriotic
Americans hit list? I fear that the future of Hispanic Americans, those who hold an incredible
buying and voting power, will forever be maids, cooks, janitors, crop pickers. Is my generation
of Hispanic youth failing to continue to reach for the American Dream? Are we destined to be
cheap labor in our own country?

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Works Cited

Castro, Amelia. Telephone Interview. 15 11 2011.

United States. U.S. Census Bureau. Hispanic Population: 2010 Census Briefs.
2010. Web. <http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-04.pdf>.

Figallo, Aldo. "Aldo Figallo from Charlotte, North Carolina." 27 07 2007. CNN.com, Online
Posting to Your E-mails: Caught between the Hispanic and American Divide. Web. 1 Dec.
2011. <http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/09/26/email.ireports

Fry, Richard, Felisa Gonzales, and Center Pew Hispanic. "One-In-Five And Growing Fast: A
Profile Of Hispanic Public School Students." Pew Hispanic Center (2008): ERIC. Web. 15
Nov. 2011.

Hing, Julianne. ColorLines.com. ARC, 18 08 2011. Web. 16 Nov 2011.

<http://colorlines.com/archives/2011/08/31_million_us_kids_live_in_poverty_today_as
_racial_inequality_deepens.html>.

Jimenez, Robert T. "It's a Difference That Changes Us": An Alternative View Of The Language

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And Literacy Learning Of Latina/O Students." Reading Teacher 54.8 (2001): 736.
MasterFILE Premier. Web. 16 Nov. 2011.

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No Child Left Behind? Reflection

Diving into the research for this project, I was primarily looking for opinions from
scholars, researchers, and students that correlated with the direction of my paper. I found
some, but most concentrated on core issues of Hispanics today, like immigration. I wanted to
direct my research to a more broad concern: the importance placed on educating and
empowering Hispanic youth today. I believed that coming into this project I would find many
stories, articles, academic journals, and people whom I can interview that shared the same
ideas and concerns I do about my topic. Luckily, I was right. Mid way through research, I had a
pretty good idea as to what the general voice of many Hispanic Americans was and how they
felt about their place in American society is. Being a Latina myself, I came into this topic with
many ideas, concerns, theories, and generalizations. Writing my research paper was difficult
because I found myself many times stepping on eggshells. I did not want to come across as
racist or anti-American in anyway. Neither did I want to appear as too American or too
Hispanic. I wanted to voice my opinion on the topic, but I kept worrying about how to
manipulate the flow of ideas in a way that made sense, striking questions into my readers head
rather than resentment.
I started my research in the universitys library data base and found plenty of articles
that dealt with Hispanic students and education. However, I noticed that the majority of those
articles were geared towards immigration and the effects it had on students. I wanted to know
more about students like methe kids who were born or raised in the United States and still
experience difficulties unique to Latinos. In the end I only found two or so journals that were

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useful for my paper. I then succeed in finding articles that opened my eyes to different areas of
my topic that I wasnt even going to cover. For example, I read an article on cnn.com that
consisted of various emails from Hispanic Americans detailing their experiences assimilating
into American culture. Reading that encourage me to touch on the different identities of a
Hispanic student. I also decided to interview some people in my family since I have family
members that range from natural born citizens to newly immigrated residences that speak
barely any English. However, I decided that choosing interviewees with a similar background to
mine helped the flow of my paper, rather than having conflicting ideas everywhere.
Interviewing my cousin Lucilina was a difficult process, I must admit. I mainly directed her
questions towards bilingualism, but the conversation (which is what it turned into rather than a
Q&A) were filled with quite a bit of resentment. I had later mold the interview into my paper
without it adding any sort of resentment towards what a reader may assume are white kids.
What surprised me in my research was the statistics I foundthe numbers looked too
big. Are we really that many? Also, as silly as it may sound, it was a little awkward reading about
my people so much. I mean, I grew up reading about African Americans in history and
references to them in literature, but Hispanics, on the other hand, were barely mentioned in
history text books when I was in middle school and high school, unless you count the current
immigration status. So to me, it was a little weird to read about my culture from someone who
isnt Hispanic at all from a historical and economical standpoint. I could say that overall, my
research answered the majority of my 10 questions in my research proposal. I feel that my topic
when I first started my research was too narrow. I went from Hispanic Students and Education
to the overall empowerment of Hispanic students. I think that broadening my topic was a smart

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decision because the broadening of it helped me touch up on things that before may have had
a small place if no place at all in my paper.
This project was not my first research project, but I never really wrote one like it before.
The ever-dreaded Senior Exit Paper CMS required students to do junior year in high school was
my first one, and frankly, my worst. It was about 7 pages long and contained a lot of
information proving my thesis. Those 7 pages were difficult to fill up; I felt like I had to really
force myself to keep writing. With this research paper, which was about the same length as the
one I did in high school, wasnt so dreadful to write. I think its because I had the freedom to be
informal in this paper and include many of my opinions and ideaseven questionswithout
having to fear formality and barriers. I had more passion when I was writing this paper because
it was a personal subject. I was encouraged to use personal experiences. Also, in this paper I
used talking headers for the first time. I really enjoyed using talking headers because I felt like it
gave me some sort of direction when writing my final draft. Writing a talking headers outline
helped me formulate how I was going to translate all my research, ideas, theories, concerns,
and personal experiences into a cohesive research paper. Coming into this project, I had the
preconceived notion that I wouldnt learn anything new. I had one straightforward concept and
I believed I would find reasons to back it up. But what I ended up finding was more questions
than answers. In my research I didnt really find anything that counteracted with what I
believed; most of my research agreed with what I was proposing. However, I ended up asking
so many more questions. I also did not anticipate myself getting so emotionally connected with
my topic.

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Mayra, your reflection sort of says it all, and describes my experience in reading your
paper. Its solid from both a research perspective and a personal, emotional position.
Interviews are very solid and add much to the secondary research. I was afraid I was forcing
you into a subject youd rather leave alonebut the passion is there, from the first paragraph
on, and Im really glad you took it on. Many people need to read it, not just members of our
class.