We know the right way to do the job. But we have never succeeded because we have never funded this part of our Federal education program with more than the tiny fraction necessary to keep the idea alive. For the MexicanAmerican children of the Southwest. for the Puerto Rican children of Boston and New York and Chicago. for the Cuban refugee children in Florida. for the French speaking children of Louisiana and Maine. for the Indian children on reservations. and for all the other ethnic Americans who are born into families which speak a language other than English and live in communities which cherish a different heritage. this has meant the highest dropout rates. the lowest median income as adults. and the kind of psychological and educational damage which permanently scars lives. The educational handicaps of these minority Americans are reflected in the statistics of the Department of Education and the Department of Labor. For our Spanish speaking populationwhich is larger than the population of 15 Spanish speaking nationsthe median number of years of schooling is only 9. while it Is 12 for the total population.
Identified stereotypes
Generalization about low income and high dropout rates among ethnic minorities.