Overcoming the barriers: school success of Mexican American graduates from Pan American University in South Texas from 1955 to 1975

摘要

This study examined the contextual factors that led to the success of MexicanAmericans who overcame extraordinary obstacles in obtaining post-secondaryeducations. Mexican Americans continue to experience great challenges to postsecondarysuccess. An in-depth case study was performed on ten subjects whomanaged to not only survive, but also do well in school and life. The purpose of thestudy was to identify obstacles these men and women had to overcome, the means theyused to overcome them, and the salience of their ethnicity to their experience. Utilizinga worldview construct and the concept of familism, findings are presented thatdemonstrate how these men and women were able to succeed educationally.First, their families placed a high value for and exposure to literacy, Englishand Spanish, in the participants?????? homes. Contrary to the fact that these participants??????homes were characterized by low levels of parental education, they were exposed tohigh levels of literacy. A second important commonality among these high achieverswas that all of them at some point in their schooling attended desegregated schoolswhere they were exposed to Anglo peers with much greater social capital than themselves. Finally, and perhaps the most important, is the profound value for hardwork that characterized almost all of these households and was channeled intodedication to studies and a strong belief that effort, perseverance, and courage wereimportant in achieving academic goals.Rather than just focusing on the barriers, the problems common to low-income,first-generation college students as do most studies on student access and success, thisstudy focuses on the creative solutions its subjects found and the kinds of support thatmade differences for them. The study records the perceptions of the successfulgraduates of the causes of their school success and tapped into their insights. Thefindings and recommendations of the study may enable educators to re-examine theirown attitudes toward the schooling of Mexican origin students and its unanticipatednegative consequences and help institutions of higher education identify policychanges that will facilitate the recruitment and retention of Hispanic and other minoritystudents.