2006/04/28 by STEPHANIE A. BOHON, Stephanie A. Bohon, MONICA KIRKPATRICK JOHNSON +3
Social Sciences · #Higher Education Research Studies #Racial and Ethnic Identity Research #Migration and Labor Dynamics
paper · doi:10.1525/sp.2006.53.2.207
We compare Cuban, Puerto Rican, and Mexican origin adolescents' desire to attend college and their perceived likelihood of attending college with those of non-Latino white and black adolescents. We find that the strength of college aspirations and expectations is high among all the groups, and that Mexican origin and Puerto Rican origin adolescents have weaker, while Cubans have stronger, aspirations and expectations than non-Latino whites. However, our findings demonstrate that the weaker college aspirations and expectations among Mexicans and the weaker expectations among Puerto Rican students are due to differences across groups in socioeconomic status, academic skill, and engagement in high school, while the stronger college aspirations and expectations of Cubans remain, even after adjusting for these measures. Furthermore, we find that parental education, family income, immigrant generation, and speaking English at home are not related to the strength of adolescents' college aspirations and expectations in the same way across Latino groups.