A native Texan, Cardenas received her bachelor of journalism degree from the University of Texas at Austin, and her doctorate in education administration from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. We are thrilled to have Dr. Cardenas back in South Texas leading this great institution. I thank her for the warm Texas hospitality that she has-she and her staff have shown Chairman Tiberi, my staff, and me, and I am looking forward to her testi mony. Chairman TIBERI. Let me introduce the rest of the panel, and then we'll begin. Thank you, Mr. Hinojosa. Our next witness today will be Ms. Olga Chapa. And let me apologize in advance if I mispronounce anybody's name. I get mine mispronounced every day, as well, so-“Chapa.” Thank you, thank you. Ms. Chapa is a Ph.D. Candidate in business administration with a concentration in international business at the University of Texas-Pan American. Her current area of focus includes the intellectual property rights of American investors in China, cultural influence on consumer complaint behaviors among the U.S. Mexican border, and the effects of stress among emergency response personnel. She was previously an intelligence analyst in the United States Army, and the director and owner of the Montessori Development Center. Thank you for being here. Ms. CHAPA. Thank you so much. Chairman TIBERI. Next witness, Dr. Raymund-"Parades". Chairman TIBERI. "Parades." Thank you. Dr. Parades is the Commissioner of Higher Education at the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. His past experiences include serving as Vice President for Programs in the Hispanic Scholarship Fund, Director of Creativity and Culture at the Rockefeller Foundation, Vice Chancellor for Academic Development at the University of California-Los Angeles. Over the course of his career, Dr. Parades has been recognized numerous times for his expertise in multiethnic education, development of educational standards, and the impact of demographic changes on American culture and education. Thank you for being with us today. Dr. Jose Jaime Rivera; Dr. Rivera is the President of the University of Sacred Heart in San Juan, Puerto Rico. As a recognized leader in higher education, Dr. Rivera has served as a consultant in the United States and Puerto Rico and throughout Central and South America. In 2002 he was recognized as the Educator of the Year by the Third International Exchange of Education and Thought for his development of a distance education model for the Hispanic community and his initiative to provide expanded student exchange opportunities for Puerto Rican students. Thank you for coming today. And our final witness, Dr. Tomas Arciniega-pretty close. Chairman TIBERI. The doctor is President Emeritus of California State University-Bakersfield. He served as president of the institution for 21 years, from 1983 to 2004. He is a recognized leader in the fields of multicultural education and institutional development and change, and has been recognized for his achievements by numerous professional associations. He's also served on the boards of several institutions and foundations, and as a Presidential appointee to the National Coalition on Education Research. Thank you for coming today. Before the panel begins, I would like to ask each of our witnesses today to limit their statements to around 5 minutes. Your entire written testimony will be included in the official hearing report, which will be distributed to the members of the Committee, the full Subcommittee and staff. With that, we will begin our testimony. After everyone's testimony is complete, then we will begin a round of questioning, and we'll have a couple of rounds of questioning, and, depending on what my colleague thinks, maybe even a third round of questioning. But it is really, really great to be here again, and let's not waste any more time. Dr. Cardenas. STATEMENT OF DR. BLANDINA CARDENAS, PRESIDENT, THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS-PAN AMERICAN, EDINBURG, TX Dr. CARDENAS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Tiberi, Congressman Hinojosa, on behalf of the students, staff and faculty of the University of Texas-Pan American, I am pleased to extend a heartfelt South Texas welcome, bienvenidos, to our beautiful Valley and to this campus. Thank you for the opportunity to address this Committee on a matter which I consider to be of great national importance. I will submit my testimony for the record. I speak to you not only from my perspective as president of this university, but I speak to you from a perspective of someone who spent the last 30 years focused on improving educational opportunities for Hispanic students and all students who do not have access to that educational opportunity. I've always done it from two perspectives: One, because I think that the human capital, the human potential that is in every child, should be developed, but also because I firmly belief that our nation, and in particular our state, require the development of a critical mass of people who are trained, credentialed, and prepared to lead and to solve the very real problems that face our nation, as well as to build on the assets that are in all of our communities. As I thought about this testimony, it occurred to me that it was important for you, Mr. Chairman, and Congressman Hinojosa, to understand the historical perspective; that is, what brings us to this point. When Lyndon Johnson signed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, he signed it in Cotulla, Texas, where he had taught in a one-room Mexican schoolhouse, segregated Mexican schoolhouse. When he signed the legislation in 1965, that one-room Mexican schoolhouse was still operating. Hispanics in states like Texas and others did experience segregated education until the '60's, and we now have de facto segregated education in many parts, and particularly in our urban centers. We are characterized because of the demographics of this part of the state. Many of our students go to school exclusively with other Latino children. That segregation diminished significantly, for other reasons that we'll talk about later, the high school completion of Hispanic students. When it came to a university experience, Hispanics, at least in this part of the country, had very little access to higher education. You could count the numbers of students from any community who managed to go to college. It wasn't until the GI bill that those numbers began to expand after World War II, and then it wasn't until the major improvement in higher education legislation that we saw those numbers increase, with the Pell Grant and others. But unlike other communities in our country, we did not have access to, if you would, national-origin based institutions of higher education. We didn't have access to mainstream institutions. We also didn't have access to segregated institutions in higher education. So our numbers, the numbers of college educated people that were produced, and in particular the numbers of people prepared to be faculty in institutions of higher education, was very, very low. This began to change somewhat as resources were made available to Hispanic Serving Institutions as a result of the work of your Committee. As these Hispanic Serving Institutions began to form their programs and advocate, through legal and other means, the urgency to create powerful graduate programs became very clear. The problem that we face in Hispanic Serving Institutions by and large across this country is that our students are still coming from a predominantly low income base, so we have to keep tuition low. The University of Texas-Pan American and the University of Texas-Brownsville charge the lowest tuition of any institutions in the UT system by a substantial margin. We're trying to keep tuition low so that we can give more students access to a baccalaureate education, and that means that we have few resources available to invest both in fellowships and program development and other-and in research, for that matter, that would allows us to grow our graduate programs. Moreover, it becomes difficult for us to recruit faculty. Young faculty coming out of our research run institutions want to go to schools where there's a doctoral program, where there's an abundance of research fellowships that they can do their research-with whom they can do their research. So we're caught in a bind. The other impact of that bind is that because we don't have the graduate resources, we don't have the doctoral programs, it becomes harder for us to access the very substantial Federal funds that go to research universities to create the solutions, if you would, to problems in diabetes, in schooling, in whatever. So we're caught in a bind. Basically, we get less because we have access to less. This legislation can make a marked difference in the lives of students and, more importantly, in the creative and problem-solving capacity of this nation. Thank you. [The prepared statement of Dr. Cardenas follows:] Statement of Dr. Blandina Cardenas, President, The University of TexasPan American, Edinburg, TX Mr. Chairman Tiberi, Congressman Hinojosa, (any other members of the Committee who are present), on behalf of the students, staff and faculty of The University of Texas Pan-American, I am pleased to extend a heartfelt South Texas welcome, Bienvenida, to our beautiful Valley and this campus. Thank you for the opportunity to address this committee on a matter of great national importance and for your leadership in engaging the significant national challenge of graduate education for Hispanics. I speak to you not only from my perspective as President of this University that leads the nation in the graduation of Mexican-Americans in bilingual education and ranks fourth in the nation in master's degrees awarded to Hispanics, but also from the perspective of almost thirty-five years of engagement at the local, state and national level in efforts to educate the critical mass of Hispanic students so necessary to the long-term economic, civic and cultural well-being of our beloved nation. Over the course of your examination of this issue, you will be presented with extensive data and analysis of the unacceptably low rates of Hispanic participation and success in graduate education. Among other statistics you will hear are that Hispanic graduate enrollment in the Biological Sciences is only 3 percent, in Engineering only 4 percent and 6 percent in the Health Sciences. While these rates appear to be improving, the rate of improvement is inadequate to meet this state's and the nation's requirements. Improving the rate of graduate enrollment and completion for any group is a slow and lengthy process. I believe it urgent that we intervene to accelerate that rate of participation and completion consistent with the accelerated demographic change that is occurring throughout the nation. In a recent Supreme Court decision on diversity on college campuses, Justice Sandra Day O Connor established as a national expectation that we might reach, within 25 years, a time when extraordinary consideration for diversity might not be necessary. It is a goal whose achievement is deeply desired by those who, like me, advocate in favor of diversity strategies. But the goal will not be achieved unless we have both the push from the Pre K-12 system and the pull from higher education institutions in all disciplines and at the undergraduate, masters and doctoral levels. For Hispanic Serving Institutions, like UTPA, the ability to pull is hampered by a lack of funds at the institutional level and at the student level. UTPA will grow more than any other institution in Texas if we keep college affordable and provide substantial financial aid. At UTPA, we serve 4,658 students who come from homes with a total family income less than $20,000. Fifty percent of our students are Pell Grant eligible. Eighty-seven percent are eligible for financial aid. Our students come from the poorest families in the nation. Even with low tuition and financial aid, they work one or two jobs-and they have the lowest loan default rate in the State of Texas, (1.1) percent. By the same token, we project that any growth in student population will not come from students who are more affluent or more privileged, it will come from students who are less affluent, who will have greater needs. Our graduates go to work rather than pursue expensive graduate and professional educations because they are driven by the noblest of family values. They choose to help their families and perhaps help fund younger brothers and sisters' undergraduate education. UTPA finds itself in the same position as its students. We are faced with the choice of raising tuition and investing in graduate education or keeping tuition low and investing in undergraduate education so that we can have more of our young people receive bachelor's degrees. Most HSI's lack the financial base to provide adequate institutional support for graduate education. The policy dilemma for the state and nation is that if you want to increase the number of Hispanics with masters and doctoral degrees, you will have to go to Hispanic Serving Institutions. As we say in Texas "if you want to fish, you must go where the fish are." Increasing the number of Hispanics in graduate education is imperative to business, industry, medicine and education. Hispanics with master's degrees will be required to lead a diverse work force and create new products and product delivery systems for a diverse national market and for competitiveness in the global market. Hispanics with doctoral degrees must be available in sufficient numbers to serve the teaching and research needs of our colleges and universities and research organizations in the private and public sector. I believe that Hispanics with post-baccalaureate preparation will bring significant added value to the creative and problemsolving enterprise-not in spite of the less privileged backgrounds, but because of it. Academic institutions, in particular, have a high stake in the production of increased numbers of Hispanic doctorates. Academics are almost always produced through mentoring. Something or someone has to make the potential scholar believe that he or she too, can become a teacher and a researcher. When I received my doctorate in 1974, there were less than a dozen Mexican-American women with doctorates in other than Romance Languages. When I stopped counting some years ago, there were more than 150 Latina women who had worked for me, requested my mentorship, or told me that they had decided to pursue a doctorate because they connected to my achievement. Hispanic faculty can be a magnet for Hispanic student interest in a discipline. Particularly in fields not traditionally sought by young Hispanics, one dynamic Hispanic Assistant Professor can boost Hispanic majors in that field almost overnight. But the demand for Hispanic faculty is rising sharply as Hispanic college enrollments increase at the same time as the overall demand in most fields far outpaces the supply. H.R. 761 holds much promise for fulfilling the national need to increase the number of Serving Institutions to build the master's program enrollments and support doctoral programs in areas of excellence. It will enable HSI's to collaborate on a more equal footing with institutions with greater graduate capacity. It will help to raise the aspirations of Title V students and the institutions that serve them. It represents a logical extension to the success and the promise of existing Title V provisions. Chairman TIBERI. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. HINOJOSA. Mr. Chairman, could we ask the presenters to bring the microphone a little closer to you, to be sure that everything at the back can hear. Chairman TIBERI. Very good suggestion. I was mesmerized by the testimony and was listening. That was very good testimony, by the way. Thank you for bringing it closer to you so everyone in the back can hear. Ms. Chapa. STATEMENT OF OLGA CHAPA, GRADUATE STUDENT, THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS-PAN AMERICAN, EDINBURG, TX Ms. CHAPA. Good afternoon, and thank you for allowing me to present this testimony to you today. Chairman TIBERI. Thank you. Ms. CHAPA. Thank you. My name is Olga Chapa and I'm presently enrolled at the college of business. I have attended the graduate program for 5 years now. I stand before you as a representative for both the master's and doctoral students of the college of business, and I can personally testify this day that the main factor that restrains our ability to begin and to finish our graduate students-studies, pardon me is the lack of funding. We're all familiar with the cost of obtaining an education. Many of us, myself included, earned our bachelor's degree attending the university part time because of financial restraints. It took me 9 years personally, and I am not alone. Some of us returned to earn a graduate degree, and taking a course here or there, repeating the same pattern as we did when we earned our bachelor's. And one of the things I noticed was the small number of Hispanic students along with me, but that was not |