Voces: Latino Students on Life in the United States

Featuring hundreds of personal anecdotes by Latino college students against a backdrop of information on their culture, history, and academic needs and strengths, this book offers a compelling and exacting view of the world of Latino students and their families.

With a large percentage of public school students being Latino, the future of America is intertwined with that of Latino youth and their educational experience. Who are these children, and how are they transforming and being transformed by this nation? Voces: Latino Students on Life in the United States serves to answer these questions, putting the focus on the voices of Latino youth and presenting the research through the real-world experiences and individual perspectives of Latino college students. The students' highly compelling yet rarely heard stories reveal the rewards and challenges of navigating two cultures and languages in school, home, and their communities and offer suggestions for how best to help other Latino youth. The student contributions are analyzed against a backdrop of information on Latino Americans, such as demographics, Spanish-English bilingualism, beliefs, traditions, and cultural practices, putting special emphasis on factors that bear on the academic and social wellbeing of Latino youth. Taking an assets-based approach, the book underscores the strengths of these students and spotlights how they are poised to enrich the American mosaic.

• Introduces readers to the experiences of Latino students through personal interviews and autobiographical essays

• Provides an overview of the culture, history, and linguistic practices of U.S. Latinos

• Presents a non-technical summary of the needs and strengths of Latino students as identified in the research literature

• Provides concrete examples of the strategies and tools used by Latino youth to deal with adversity and succeed in life

• Takes real-world situations to demonstrate how the actions of educators and other adults help or hinder these students