Immigrant Teens

1434 Words3 Pages

Introduction
In this paper we discuss why it is that teen Latino immigrants have the highest high school dropout rates. From a sociological perspective, I think it’s important to know why this particular group have the lowest educational attainment to better comprehend the challenges as well as the consequences for both the wellbeing of immigrant teens and their socioeconomic status in this country. This paper focuses on Latino immigrant teens as they represent the majority of immigrant youth in America and as a way to illustrate risk and circumstances that are potentially shared by other immigrant groups; Immigrant teens can face unique challenges related to cultural and social adaptation, language proficiency and poverty. Failure to address …show more content…

Based on census statistics LEP teens are twice as likely as their English-speaking counterparts to drop out of school.
The education system faces a great challenge in serving immigrant youth when it comes to incorporating them in the classroom. The language acquisition is easier for younger children and increases with the time spent in the United States but these newly arriving immigrant teens have a very limited time not only to learn English, but to study the required material for standardize testing, and catch up to their native English speaking peers before graduation. Thus, performing under this enormous amount of pressure can leave students feeling overwhelm and with a higher chance of subsequently drop out.
Lack of family …show more content…

(U.S. Census Bureau, 2010). Amongst the most prevalent dropout risk factors are language barrier, lack of support and stereotyping. Immigrant teens are often racially and ethnically segregated but also linguistically isolated. School environment have been demonstrated to affect school behavior and academic outcomes. Social support is an essential component in smoothing school engagement and improving the likelihood of school completion among ethnic and racial minorities’ youth. Social support provided predominately by families and educators, is in fact associated with positive school outcomes and it has also shown to be effective in stimulating positive personal and academic growth for students at-risk of

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