Over the weekend UNM hosted the Latino Higher Education National Policy Summit, gathering more than 100 administrators, officials and students from across the nation.
Cheo Torres, vice president of Student Affairs, said the group hoped to improve Hispanic success in higher education.
The summit attendees worked on four issues: higher-education leadership, higher-education achievement, the impact of immigration and achievement in math, science and engineering.
Torres said those who were invited to the conference divided into four teams to cover these issues. The think tanks then recorded their discussions and compiled recommendations to send to policymakers.
"We timed it so that it would be done for the presidential campaign, so we can get these recommendations to the presidential candidates and get them to adopt some of these recommendations as part of their platform," Torres said.
Monte Perez of Golden West College in California said he hoped policymakers would listen to the summit's recommendations.
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"Our plan is to come out with a summit publication which will be disseminated widely to trustees, regents, presidents, the presidential campaign and elected officials," Perez said. "We want to say to them, 'If you were trying to develop policies to address the under-representation and the lack of completion of Latinos in higher education, here's what you'd need to do.'"
William V. Flores, the deputy secretary of New Mexico's Higher Education Department, said officials should listen because improving Hispanic educational performance is critical to the future of the U.S. economy.
"If we don't resolve the education gap, it's going to result in the U.S. losing 400 billion dollars and 20 percent of its gross national product by 2020," Flores said. "And if we do address it, if we do help to close the gap and help minorities get degrees, it will add an additional 800 billion dollars to the GNP."
Sergio Najera, a Spanish major at UNM, said he is planning to get his master's in student affairs in higher education. He said attending the summit helped him see the importance of what he could do with his degree.
"I talked about different ideas on recruitment and how to get more students involved at colleges and other universities, getting students into higher-education institutions," Najera said.
Perez was in the same discussion group as Najera and had similar ideas.
"We want to see all high school students take a college preparatory course," Perez said. "For example, all students have to know Algebra II. If you create that kind of policy, then you create college-ready
students."
Najera said he believes students need to earn bachelor's and even graduate degrees so they can live better lives.
"Getting that bachelor's degree and going on to grad school is important, because it's going to get you somewhere nice. Without it, it's harder to find a job and network with other people," he said.
Najera said he will continue working with Hispanic issues throughout his career.
"I'm Latino myself,Λ‡and it's hard to see other Latinos not be able to get somewhere," he said.
Perez served on the planning committee for the summit and said the conference was the product of a year and a half of organization.
Perez said though there were attendees from California, Colorado, Texas and many other states, New Mexico was the perfect place to hold the summit.
"We wanted to have it in a place that symbolizes the struggle and the whole notion of Hispanic and Latino issues, and we thought New Mexico would be good," Perez said. "This is the motherland for Latinos because New Mexico has a rich history of Hispanic presence."
