Research and Policy
Since 2004, Excelencia has been the national leader in developing strategic research guided by the experiences and realities of today's Latino and other post-traditional students to inform action by community and institutional leaders and policy makers that facilitates institutional change.
Excelencia uses a Latino lens to bring to the forefront what we know about Latino student success, what works to improve it, and what decision makers can do.
Excelencia in Education’s Policy Priorities: 2025
Now is a pivotal moment for our country, our students, and our institutions of higher education. Higher education remains a key driver of economic growth, civic engagement, and social mobility. For Latino students—and all students—to achieve economic prosperity, institutional, state, and federal policies must center on their realities: their needs, educational pathways, and contributions to the country’s workforce and economy.
Excelencia’s policy agenda advocates for accelerating Latino student success to close gaps in degree attainment based on the current profile of Latinos in higher education. Four policy issues were continually raised among leading institutions committed to supporting Latino student success: 1) workforce, 2) institutional capacity, 3) college affordability, and 4) retention and transfer.
Research Library
Excelencia in Education accelerates Latino student success in higher education by promoting Latino student achievement and informing educational policies with a Latino lens. Since the organization’s founding, Excelencia has been the leading information source on Latinos in higher education, making our research and policy priorities available for the public to inform and compel action on Latino enrollment, completion, and workforce nationally.
Find information on Latinos and education pathways, financial aid, institutional practices, student success, workforce, HSI related research, and more.
Refine your search of Excelencia’s research by using the filters on the right.
Hearing from Presidents of Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs)
December 2006
Hearing from Presidents of Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) : Defining Student Success, Measures of Accountability, and What it Means to be an HSI profiles responses from individual interviews with college presidents to better understand their perspectives on three main topics: 1. Defining student success; 2. Measuring institutional accountability; and, 3. Describing what it means to be an HSI.
Inventing Hispanic-Serving Institutions: The Basics
February 2006
This brief serves as a primer on the conditions and history behind the invention of HSIs (Hispanic-Serving Institutions), the processes for identification, the general institutional characteristics of HSIs, and notes how these institutions are contributing to Latino student success.
How Latino Students Pay For College: Patterns of Financial Aid in 2003-04
July 2005
Although the percentage of Latino students receiving financial aid for college is at an all-time high, Latinos receive the lowest average federal aid awards of any racial or ethnic group, according to a new report released August 10, 2005, by Excelencia in Education and the Institute for Higher Education Policy.
