Majority California Students Latino

Latino students make up 51% of California’s school students, that’s 3.1 million kids, making Latinos the majority in this state’s school system. At the same time, 25% of Latino students drop out of high school in California and only 16% of the state’s teachers are Latino. I’m sure the two are, in no way, related.

But as we’ve reported here before, the Latino population is growing across the nation, set to bust 50 million in the coming Census.

The biggest takeaway from these recent figures in California is that institutions need to start to adapt to the changing reality. Every single person in the U.S. is living this change — not just people in Arizona or people in California or people in Texas. Across the entire country Latinos are forming an ever-increasing part of work, school, education, government and civic life and if the rest of the country wants to continue to grow, they have no choice but to grow with a new Latino-saturated reality.

What this means is that school districts, businesses, schools, institutions and other organizations need to be proactive about hiring Latinos, including them in planning decisions if they want to be successful. What it means for Latinos is that they have to get involved in their schools and communities if they want to have a seat at the table.

Thoughts? What do you think about the impending Latino-filled future?