Number of minorities taking SAT, attending college rises
9/21/2009
| Chattanooga Times Free Press
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By Perla Trevizo ptrevizo@timesfreepress.com
Seeing her father lose his job and her mother working in a carpet mill was all the encouragement Rosario Reyna needed to know she should go to college.
“I knew I needed to better myself in order to be able to help them later on in life,” said the 18-year-old first-generation college student from Calhoun, Ga.
Ms. Reyna is among a growing number of minority students taking the Scholastic Aptitude Test as a step toward applying and going to college, according to data released by The College Board.
This year’s college-bound seniors are the most diverse group to ever take the SAT, with minorities making up 40 percent of the 1.5 million test-takers, The College Board reported.
Hispanic students represent the largest and fastest-growing minority group taking the test and account for 13.5 percent of all SAT takers, compared with 7.8 percent 10 years ago.
“It’s very heartening for us to see that that number is growing because it’s showing us that more kids from diverse backgrounds are striving to go to college and they are taking the steps to do that,” said Maria de los Angeles Corral, associate director of Latino marketing and communications for The College Board.
One of the factors contributing to the growing diversity of SAT takers, especially Hispanics, is population growth, she said.
But she said a larger number of Hispanics coming to this country “are coming of age at that point where they are ready to go to college and they are becoming more familiarized, more aware of the college-going process,” Ms. Corral added.
Tennessee and Georgia both reported increased numbers of minorities taking the SAT, although Tennessee’s numbers are too small to interpret because it historically has been an American College Test state, said Brian O’Reilly, executive director for SAT program relations.
About 6,000 Tennessee students took the SAT last year, compared to 52,000 who took the ACT. And out of those, about 70 percent identified themselves as white.
Despite the small number of students who took the SAT in Tennessee, significantly more black students took the exam in both states, and more Asians and Hispanics in Georgia, than in past years.
Over the past 20 years, the number of black students taking the SAT has gone up 44 percent, and the number rose 15 percent just over the past year, said Mr. O’Reilly.
In the past year in Georgia, 10 percent more black students took the SAT, 9 percent more Asians and 12 percent more Hispanics.
Angela Harris, dean of enrollment services at Dalton State College, said minority student enrollment is increasing, although the SAT cannot be directly associated with that growth because it’s not the college’s only entrance exam.
“Because our universal population is increasing with minorities ... the trend is going to be that we have more minorities enrolling in the schools,” she said. “And in my opinion, college people are responding by attracting students so our college demographics will be similar to our overall census population.”
Ms. Reyna, who is in her first year of business administration at Dalton State College, said it’s very exciting for her to know more Hispanics and minorities are pursuing higher education.
“There were a couple of times when I thought college wasn’t possible for me, but I realized there wasn’t going to be anybody pushing me but myself,” she said.
The value of having a diverse population is a richer educational environment said Dr. Harris.
“It’s a sad day when we, as educators, don’t embrace the whole spectrum of diversity,” she said.