I profited greatly from discussions with Drs. James Aldridge and Israel Cuellar. However, these words and ideas are my own, and I take sole responsibility for what I have written in this article.
Hispanic students typically enter college with poor test scores, relative to nonHispanic whites or to Asians (see data from Educational Testing Service and from the American College Testing Program, in yearly issues of the Chronicle of Higher Education Almanac). Based on the author's experience teaching at the second largest Hispanic university in the nation, I have witnessed firsthand many of the difficulties that Hispanic students encounter. However, the author stumbled upon a remarkably simple but effective way to assist Hispanic students in their struggle toward academic achievement. This involved little more than informing the students about his personal interest, and confidence in their ability.
This is the story of how I learned to teach more effectively to Hispanic college students who had initially performed horribly in my Introduction to Psychology classes. I teach psychology classes at the second largest Hispanic university in the nation (UTPA, 2001). The University of Texas-Pan American (UTPA) has 10,507 Hispanic students, out of a total enrollment of 12,569 students. The only university in the U.S. with more Hispanic students is Florida International University, in Miami, Florida, with 16,469 Hispanic students, out of a total enrollment of 31,293 students. UTPA is located in Edinburg, Texas, a city that is, 86% Hispanic. It is located in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, 15 miles from the Mexican border. I use the descriptor “Hispanic” since that is the more commonly used term in this region, but I realize that in California and, perhaps, other areas, “Latino” is considered more appropriate.
Most UTPA students, 94%, are from “the Valley,” as locals refer to it. A few students commute from Mexico--many of whom live across the border in Reynosa. Until the Fall 1999 semester, UTPA was an open admissions school. Even now when about 25% of the applicants are rejected, the average high school grade point average and test scores for incoming students are low, relative to nonHispanic whites or to Asians (University of Texas-Pan American, 1998a, 1998b, 2001). For example, the mean ACT score is 17 for UTPA students, compared to a national average around 21 (University of Texas-Pan American, 2001). Only 25% of the students graduated in the top 80% of their high school classes, while 15% graduated in the bottom 20%. Most of the students work, and most are bilingual to some degree. Unemployment in the area surrounding UTPA is among the highest in the nation, with unemployment figures typically in the double digits. But, due in large part to NAFTA, the Lower Rio Grande Valley is also one of the fastest growing areas in the nation.
Malecki (2000) asserted that one way institutions of higher education can improve the quality of their undergraduates is to admit only high-quality students. That may be true, but it would be disaster for most students at open admissions schools, or schools like UTPA with relatively low admission standards. It might seem, at first blush, that the horrible college performance of UTPA students is consistent with their horrible high school records. Indeed, when I was thinking of coming to UTPA I was chastened by a faculty member’s blunt warning about the undergraduates “They are godawful students.”
Further, I was also told that working with UTPA undergraduates would be like teaching high school students. Incidentally, even the graduate students at UTPA have less than sterling test scores, with a mean GRE verbal score of 383 and 419 quantitative score. However, in spite of my colleague’s harsh description, I have come to be quite impressed with both my graduate and undergraduate students.
Shortly after arriving at UTPA, things seemed to be going fine with my first group of Introduction to Psychology students. The students seemed interested in the subject and were willing to discuss various aspects of the text and the lectures. But, after I gave the first exam, I discovered to my chagrin that the honeymoon was over, especially for me. I was devastated to find that half my class of 40 students scored no more than a D or F on my multiple-choice exam. This was true even though I had provided a thorough pre-test review. If anything, I felt that perhaps I had been too helpful, and that it might now be impossible for students not to do well on subsequent exams. Not so!
In a post-exam discussion with my students. I tried, unsuccessfully, to discern why they had done so poorly. I talked with them about ways to study better, i.e., the importance of reading the text until they understood it fully. This strategy helped a bit. Subsequent exam scores, while not great, were never as poor as those on the first exam. However, they remained well below what I felt was acceptable. Indeed, this continued to be the case, even though I offered reviews for each exam, during which I made it crystal clear what and how to study. While on the first exam twenty students had made a D or an F, on the second exam there were nine D’s and two F’s, and on the third exam there were six D’s and two F’s.
I employed the same approach the following semester with my next Introduction to Psychology class. Furthermore, I informed my students about how poorly my first semester class had performed on the exams. Again, my warning helped a little. Although students scored many fewer D’s and F’s, not a single student in this class of sixteen students made an A on the first exam. And, what makes this even more troubling is that my exams are not excessively difficult. In the past, students at other institutions have scored C’s or B’s on my exams. Here at UTPA that was not the case. Such low exam scores were not explicable by UTPA’s low admissions standards, since I had taught at an open admissions school previously, and the students did not do so horribly on my exams. Thus, I was convinced that the source of the explanation must lie elsewhere.
Before the second exam of my second semester, I went over with my students, once again, about the fact that they were in college, about how they should adopt more effective study habits, and about how they should not wait for their teacher to tell them what to do. Some of this may have contributed to their improved exam grades. However, I am convinced that the main source of their improvement was that I communicated, with some passion, two new things to them:
Without 2 added to 1, my pre-exam pep talk might have sounded like just another putdown. Hispanics often feel put down, and may grow up feeling they are not as “good” as other students (Barrera, 2001). Thus, especially in the classroom context I have now learned that it is crucial to temper any criticism with positive reinforcement, as well.
It was amazing how much better my students performed on their remaining exams. I tried to find out directly from students why their exam performance should have improved so dramatically. In a classroom discussion, the most I could glean from them—voiced by several students—was the admission “We studied.” Studying hardly seemed like the source of a breakthrough.
The real question was: Why were my students finally studying enough to be so successful?
The only substantial factor that had been altered before the exam was the time I had taken to express my faith in their ability to succeed. Thus, I have the strong impression that this modification in our student-teacher interpersonal relationship made the difference. When I indicated that I had a problem with my students’ exam performance, and, crucially, when I did so in a way that permitted them to maintain their self-esteem, I believe they might have been emboldened to further enhance their status in my eyes—and their own.
Most of the books on educational psychology have little if anything to say about interpersonal teacher-student relationships as crucial for students’ college performance. Nevertheless, I now believe that positive student-teacher relationships are pivotal to student performance—especially for students who are unused to being encouraged by teachers and educational institutions. So, I believe my students’ markedly improved success was not merely or even much a matter of my lectures about study methods, but it was, rather, my expression of my affirmation of faith in their unrealized potential that made the difference. To please me more, my students studied more, apparently much more. It may be that some students do not need this interpersonal approval or disapproval to study well. But, others may, perhaps especially those who are the first in their family to go to college. Here my expressions and affect was critical of them, but gave them a route by which they could improve my feelings about them. We need to look at cultural variables if we want to succeed, seeing how different cultures respond to different situations (Cuellar & Paniagua, 2000). We cannot assume that the cultural values we possess will be valued by people from a different culture. Some people will be “deviant” (i. e., “different”) relative to the values and judgments of others (Eisenman, 1991), but you need to look at things in terms of varying cultural standards—especially if you happen to be a teacher in a multicultural setting.
Many would say that Hispanic students are poor students, that they cannot do well in college. Much of the information appears to point in this direction. But, my own experience indicates that better, more positive, constructive teacher-student relationships can make all the difference.
Despite all the handicaps of students at UTPA—due to high levels of exposure to poverty, discrimination, low academic achievement and test scores, etc.—they often do well, and many have gone on to successful graduate study at such institutions as Stanford, Wisconsin, University of Texas Southwest Medical Center, etc. We need to stop blaming culture, and to stop thinking that there is only one “right” way to teach (Argyris, 1998). Based upon my experience, I believe that encouragement and demonstrations of real concern from teachers is probably far more helpful to students than most educators generally realize.
Argyris, C. (1998). Teaching smart people how to learn. In Harvard Business Review, Business classics: Fifteen key concepts for managerial success. Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing Corp.
Barrera, C. R. (2001, Feb. 2). When you feel ‘different.’ The Chronicle of Higher Education. The Chronicle Review, Section 2. B18. (letter).
Cuellar, I. & Paniagua, F. A. (Eds.) (2000). Handbook of multicultural mental health: Assessment and treatment of diverse populations. San Diego: Academic Press.
Eisenman, R. (1991). From crime to creativity: Psychological and social factors in deviance. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt.
Malecki, E. S. (2000). Teaching/power: Part II. Radical Pedagogy: 2, 1.
University of Texas-Pan American (1998a). Planning assumptions: 1996-2000. Edinburg, TX: Author.
University of Texas-Pan American (1998b). 1998 University Fact Book. Edinburg, TX: Author.
University of Texas-Pan American (2001). 2001 University Fact Book. Edinburg, TX: Author.
University second in nation in Hispanic student enrollment. (2001, Spring/Summer). Los Arcos, 7 (3), 4.
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