dropout rate of 27 percent compared to 11 percent for African Americans, 7 percent for whites, and 4
percent for Asian Americans (U. S. Department of Education 2001).
Second, Latinos are more likely to attend failing schools than are whites. One study finds, for
example, that almost 40 percent of Latino students, compared to 11 percent of whites, attend high schools
where attrition rates are 40 percent or more (Balfanz and Legter 2004). Valencia (1997, 1) states,
“millions of minority students (particularly African American, Mexican Americans, and Puerto Ricans)
attend schools that are segregated, inequitably financed, vapid in curricula delivery, teacher-centered and
generally hostile in any sense of a learning environment.”
Finally, an additional rationale may be found in the religiosity of many Latinos. Despite
declining levels of Catholic affiliation among Latinos (Hunt 1998), a majority of Latinos in the U.S.
identify themselves as Catholic. In his study of Latino support for school vouchers, Leal (2004) finds that
Latino support for vouchers is largely a consequence of their Catholicism and the belief that their children
may obtain a quality education in neighborhood Catholic schools. In its current form, NCLB requires that
low-performing schools provide parents with information and funding to obtain supplemental educational
services, which include tutoring, after school services, and summer school programs; or, parents have the
option to send their children to a better performing public traditional or charter school (U.S. Department
of Education 2002). Although NCLB does not include a provision that would allow parents to send their
children to private or parochial schools, many parents with children in low-performing schools remain
interested in this option (Howell 2004; see also Tabea 2003).
Minority Opposition
There are, however, several reasons to reject the minority support hypothesis. Although Latinos
and African Americans are more likely to attend “failing” schools, parents of these children are still
generally very supportive of public education in general, as well as their public school. They tend to
believe that reforms of the existing system and structure are called for long before reconstituting schools
(see Tabea 2003). Exit polls conducted in California and Michigan in 2000 show that racial and ethnic
groups largely opposed vouchers when given the opportunity to vote their preferences. According to the
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Convention