Mexican Imms In New York Struggling With Education

The New York Times reported this week about the fastest growing immigrant group in New York City — Mexicans — and the terrible statistics associated with this group’s educational attainment. The report noted:

About 41 percent of all Mexicans between ages 16 and 19 in the city have dropped out of school, according to census data.

No other major immigrant group has a dropout rate higher than 20 percent, and the overall rate for the city is less than 9 percent, the statistics show.

This crisis endures at the college level. Among Mexican immigrants 19 to 23 who do not have a college degree, only 6 percent are enrolled. That is a fraction of the rates among other major immigrant groups and the native-born population.

Reasons given for the low educational attainment rates include: poverty and low educational attainment in Mexico, teenage pregnancy, legal status, language barriers, lack of an established social safety net, finances and more.