Raising Latino achievement seen as 'demographic imperative'

Our take: With strong growing numbers in the Latino community, there is a new effort to help the lagging educational achievement in this population.

By 2020, one in four children enrolled in America's K-12 public schools will be Latino.

Of those Latino students, more than half will be second-generation Americans, born in the United States to at least one parent who is an immigrant. Another third will be at least third-generation Americans, the children of parents who were also born in this country, according to projections from the Pew Hispanic Center, a Washington-based research organization. The remainder will be immigrants themselves, though they will be part of a diminishing stream of young Latinos moving to the United States from Spanish-speaking countries.

With such strong and growing numbers, the educational achievement of this diverse community of studentswho increasingly live in states and communities where Latinos were virtually nonexistent even a decade agohas implications for the national economy, local labor markets, and prospects for upward social mobility for millions of Hispanic Americans.

Read more about Raising Latino achievement on Education Week.