Noting that young children in poverty face a greater likelihood of impaired development because of their increased exposure to a number of risk factors associated with poverty, this report presents statistical information on the incidence of poverty during early childhood. The report notes that the poverty rate for U.S. children under age 3…

This book is a detailed account of the effects of parental involvement in a literacy project on Latino children's academic performance, addressing methods of parent participation, home literacy uses by children, and the nature of school experiences. The first two chapters provide family literacy and Intergenerational Literacy Project background…

The purpose of this report was to locate the dropout crisis- to determine its scale and scope by identifying the number of high schools with severe dropout problems, detailing the states, cities, and locales where they are concentrated, and establishing who attends them. For this analysis of high schools across the country, two cut-points were…

Miami-Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS) earned a performance grade of "B" for the second year in a row and was just seven points short of the points required to earn an "A." This Research Capsule summarizes several key elements that contributed to the district's achievement. Results indicate that, in most cases, students'…

Special issue dedicated to studies on contemporary Spanish American literature. (DS)

Eighty-five sixth-grade students were randomly assigned to either a traditional instruction or a systems instructional group and were blocked according to sex and ethnicity. Following eight months of mathematics instruction, skill assessments found significant differences for adding and subtracting fractions subtests related to both instructional…

A multistrategy approach (involving use of informants to select items, a multidimensional scaling method, factor analysis, and nomological validation) was applied to refine 24 of Collins's locus of control items for use among Hispanic and non-Hispanic subjects. Only the Difficult-Easy World factor was found to be clearly cross-culturally…

Spanish-English code switching in the context of Miami health care services is examined, focusing on the transactional role relationships that require Spanish language use. Examples are taken from printed sources and oral language. Semantic shift, vocabulary adaptation, syntactic code switching, and Spanish acquisition by non-Hispanics are…

Describes community involvement components in culturally oriented teacher education program, i.e., preservice and inservice community agency assignments, oncampus cultural preparation. Reveals that cultural immersion student teacher programs are attractive and professionally advantageous. (AH)

Describes cases of police abuse of Hispanics in the United States, particularly in the Southwest; examines how community groups and Hispanic organizations are working for the prosecution of abusive law enforcement officers; and discusses improving relations between the police and the community and joint efforts to minimize police abuse in some…

Discusses issues pertinent to the testing of Hispanic children whose learning difficulties may indicate a handicap. Describes the System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment (SOMPA) (Mercer and Lewis, 1979), reviews the educational status of Hispanic children in the United States, and outlines preliminary findings from the SOMPA II project.…

Educational data confirm that the involvement of Hispanics in marine sciences has been, and still is, quite limited. However, the data also reveal, by inference, that an increasing number of Hispanic students (including those in Puerto Rico) are choosing marine sciences disciplines as careers. (Author/JN)

Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans, and Cubans have had different geographical and cultural experiences. Problems specific to each group, and educational strategies to solve them, are presented to promote cultural pluralism in the schools. (JN)

Examines proverb use among 304 Mexican Americans (aged 16-85) of Los Angeles (California), assembling information on how or where particular proverbs were learned, with whom or what kind of individual their use is associated, the occasions on which they are used, and general attitudes toward the use of proverbs. (LC)

Seventy-two Black and Hispanic fourth through sixth graders completed a variety of problem-solving tasks emphasizing skills of preparation, production, and judgment. With reading achievement controlled within the sample, results suggest that these three sets of skills involve evaluative activity and that locus of control and self-esteem are…