RWJF Center Recognized as Effective in Increasing Latino Student Success in Higher Education

The Robert Wood John­son Foun­da­tion Cen­ter for Health Pol­icy at the Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico was rec­og­nized recently at the United States Capi­tol for being among America’s top pro­grams that increase aca­d­e­mic oppor­tu­ni­ties and improve achieve­ment for Latino stu­dents at the asso­ciate, bach­e­lor and grad­u­ate levels.

Elected offi­cials and higher edu­ca­tion lead­ers from across the coun­try joined Exce­len­cia in Edu­ca­tion in hon­or­ing RWJF Center.

The RWJF Cen­ter was selected for its work at the grad­u­ate level from among 159 com­peti­tors as one of 16 national final­ists for the 2012 Exam­ples of Exce­len­cia recog­ni­tion. The accom­pa­ny­ing release of “What Works for Latino Stu­dent Suc­cess in Higher Edu­ca­tion” is part of a port­fo­lio of hun­dreds of evidence-based prac­tices that insti­tu­tions and pol­icy mak­ers can draw on to improve Latino stu­dent success.

Lati­nos will have to earn 5.5 mil­lion col­lege degrees by 2020 for Amer­ica to achieve Pres­i­dent Barack Obama’s goal of Amer­i­can world lead­er­ship in col­lege degrees by 2020.

Over the past seven years, Exce­len­cia in Edu­ca­tion has sys­tem­at­i­cally iden­ti­fied and eval­u­ated more than 500 pro­grams and depart­ments that demon­strate with evi­dence that they effec­tively boost Latino enroll­ment, per­for­mance and grad­u­a­tion. Top hon­ors this year went to pro­grams run by Valen­cia Col­lege in Orlando, Fla.; Cal­i­for­nia State Uni­ver­sity, Bak­ers­field; and The Uni­ver­sity of Texas, El Paso.

“Amer­ica can­not become the world leader in col­lege degrees, nor will it have a glob­ally com­pet­i­tive work­force in the future, if it does not focus on improv­ing Latino col­lege com­ple­tion,” said Rep. Charles Gon­za­lez, chair­man, Con­gres­sional His­panic Cau­cus, who spoke at the event.

“As one of this year’s national final­ists, the Robert Wood John­son Foun­da­tion Cen­ter for Health Pol­icy at the Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico is at the fore­front of meet­ing the chal­lenge of improv­ing higher edu­ca­tional achieve­ment for Latino stu­dents,” said Sarita Brown, pres­i­dent of Exce­len­cia in Edu­ca­tion. “With 2020 quickly approach­ing, we have accu­mu­lated a sig­nif­i­cant port­fo­lio of evidence-based prac­tices that insti­tu­tions and pol­icy mak­ers can and must put into action.”

“The RWJF Cen­ter strives to increase the diver­sity of schol­ars and national lead­ers in the social and behav­ior sci­ences come from his­tor­i­cally under-represented com­mu­ni­ties pre­pared to work in inter­dis­ci­pli­nary teams with clin­i­cians to address the social, polit­i­cal and eco­nomic issues that con­tribute to mak­ing our com­mu­ni­ties, fam­i­lies and indi­vid­u­als healthy,” said Robert Valdez, exec­u­tive direc­tor and RWJF pro­fes­sor of Fam­ily and Com­mu­nity Med­i­cine and Eco­nom­ics at UNM.

Deb­o­rah San­ti­ago, vice pres­i­dent of Exce­len­cia in Edu­ca­tion, said, “By shar­ing what works, we hope to prompt edu­ca­tors and pol­i­cy­mak­ers to chal­lenge the cur­rent sta­tus of Latino achieve­ment in higher edu­ca­tion and inspire these deci­sion mak­ers to work to increase Latino stu­dent success.”

Exce­len­cia in Edu­ca­tion is a Wash­ing­ton, D.C.-based non-profit orga­ni­za­tion whose mis­sion is to accel­er­ate Latino stu­dent suc­cess in higher education.