Editor,
Luke Marczak wrote a letter published in the Daily Lobo on Feb. 18 in which he raised concerns on Raza Graduation.
He asked for one thing specifically: objectivity. Well Marczak, here it goes.
According to the U.S. Census, in 2007, of the 86 percent of adults nationwide who reported finishing high school, only 29 percent had college degrees. Further, only 13 percent of those degrees went to Hispanics.
Let's do the math. As of Feb. 19, the census reports that 343,471,191 people live in America. Of them, 295,385,224 have completed high school, and 85,661,715 of them have college degrees.
Of that total, 11,136,022 are Hispanic graduates. Clearly, there is still a gap in the graduation rates between Hispanics and other groups when only 13 percent of all degrees go to Hispanic graduates.
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Being Hispanic myself, I find I am one of the few of my peers who have made it this far. In my entire family tree, which spans dozens of people, only five of us will have earned a college degree by May.
Therefore, I consider it a special achievement to be able to graduate in May, and I want to share this occasion with my family members, some of whom live outside this state in the U.S. and in Mexico.
There may be an educational attainment gap, but events such as Raza Graduation reward students who are not equally represented in national college graduation statistics. We celebrate each other as a community and encourage our peers to continue to work toward reducing the education gap.
On May 10, I will go through with Raza Graduation, and on May 17, conform to the collective society and celebrate my achievement with all of UNM.
I would not call you a racist, Marczak, based on your letter alone. I won't even waste anymore thought on Peter Lynch - we've given him his 15 minutes.
However, I do ask you to let us celebrate our way, and leave us alone. Freedom to assemble peacefully is one of our constitutional rights, Hispanic or not. Let us exercise our rights collectively as a society.
Is that objective enough?
Alberto Belmares
UNM student
