On May 19, the Office of Corporate, Government & Foundation Relations at Saint Xavier applied for a Title V Hispanic Serving Institutions grant. The decision for whether or not Saint Xavier will be approved should be arriving at any time now.
“[The Hispanic Serving Institutions grant] comes through the Department of Education. It is supposed to provide grants to Hispanic serving institutions to expand education opportunities for Hispanic students.
However, the benefits of the grant do not have to be exclusively for Hispanic students, it can benefit the entire student body,” said Ruth Hansen, associate director of Corporate, Government & Foundation relations.
According to the Department of Education website, “these grants also enable [Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs)] to expand and enhance their academic offerings, program quality, and institutional stability.”
For a school to qualify for this grant, 25% of their undergraduate student population needs to be Hispanic. “We looked at the Hispanic part of our student body, which, as of last year’s numbers, was over 27% of the undergraduate population. That is a pretty significant part of the population,” said Hansen.
The percentage of Hispanic undergraduates at Saint Xavier is not the only reason why Hansen believes the university is eligible for this grant. “The Department of Education has an interest in helping students that come from lower income backgrounds, who come from ethnically and racially diverse backgrounds, succeed. […] They want people to go to school and they want people to be successful,” said Hansen.
This is something that is not new to the Saint Xavier community, considering that over half of the student population receives Pell Grants. If Saint Xavier is approved for the HSI grant, there are many things that they hope to do with the $2,625,000 that they will be awarded.
“We came up with six different parts of our strategy and the overall goal was really to increase student retention and increase graduation rates. We did that with goals looking at the overall student body, but then also looking at the Hispanic part of our student body,” said Hansen.
The list of strategies was put together by the Title V Hispanic Serving Institutions Proposal Steering Committee which consisted of many professors, staff members, as well as student representation.
There were also many focus groups put together to find out what sort of services students would find useful to them. “What we came up with is what we’re calling an Access and Success Center which would help coordinate the student resources that largely already exist,” said Hansen.
This resource would help students be able to easily find a solution to an issue that they are having. Instead of having to seek out a person that may or may not exist, there would be someone available to help steer students in the right direction.
Alex Quezada, a senior communications major, seemed to have a similar thought in mind for what students needed when it comes to direction. “I think more guidance is necessary. A lot of Hispanic students are first generations and do not know how to do things like apply for loans or stay on track with what credits they need to graduate,” said Quezada.
In fact, 81% of Hispanic students at Saint Xavier are first generation college students, meaning that they are the first in their family to attend a college or university.
“Another [goal] would be to establish a center for intercultural learning and collaboration. What that would do is to just very intentionally bring together staff, faculty, and student representatives to have these conversations about being culturally diverse,” said Hansen.
Saint Xavier boasts a very culturally diverse campus with over half of the student population coming from Hispanic, African-American, multi-racial, and Asian, as well as other ethnic descents.
Another strategy comes in the form of an expanded writing center.
“We would like to expand the writing center to include more supports for people whom English is not their first language, because being able to speak a language and being able to write fluently for academic or professional papers is a different style,” said Hansen.
While this support is aimed more at students that grew up in Spanish speaking households, Hansen believes that it could benefit anyone.
“This is one of those things that we think would definitely benefit students who grew up in a Spanish speaking household, but we think it would also benefit people coming from Chinese or Middle Eastern speaking households; Really anywhere where English was not the primary language that they learned to write in,” said Hansen.
Other things that the committee put in their proposal to the Department of Education include expanded career services, specified tutoring programs, and increased support for both first year students and sophomore students that are entering their junior year.
With the money from the HSI grant, Saint Xavier would be able to expand and add many resources for students, all while keeping student retention and graduation rates in mind. “There’s always more that you want to do than you have people, time, and money for, so this would provide some of the resources we need. No, it won’t let us do everything, because we like to dream big, but it’ll let us do a lot of it,” said Hansen.
A decision from the Department of Education on whether or not Saint Xavier will be receiving this grant should be arriving at anytime now.
Lauren Dwyer
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