Excelencia in Education Launches Initiative Focused on Latino College Completion and Ensuring America's Future

Hispanics comprise the country's largest racial, or ethnic, minority, numbering 48.4 million people or 16 percent of the American population. By 2025, at least one report suggests, nearly one-fourth of all college- and university-aged adults in the United States are expected to be Latino. But even with a variety of scholarships designed especially for Hispanics, a group known as Excelencia in Education contends that there aren't enough Latinos obtaining the degrees that might help ensure them, and the United States, a brighter future.

Excelencia in Education has launched an initiative designed to change that. "In today's knowledge driven economy, a college degree is critical to the success of a competitive and high earning worker," Excelencia in Education President Sarita Brown was quoted in a September initiative announcement as saying. The initiative, Ensuring America's Future by Increasing Latino College Completion, has the support of the Bill and Melinda Gates and Kresge Foundations, which offer scholarships and grants that might help Hispanic students better obtain their degrees.