Using just-released U.S. Census data, the Pew Hispanic Trends Project reported that the higher education enrollment rate of 18- to 24-year-old Latino high school graduates reached 49 percent in 2012 compared to 47 percent of non-Hispanic White high school graduates. With Latinos having a higher high school dropout rate than Whites, the proportion of all Latinos from 18 to 24 in college is below that of Whites—37.5 percent among Latinos compared to 42.1 percent among Whites, according to the Pew Hispanic Trends Project analysis.
“Probably the most important finding of this new Census [data] release is that not only are more Hispanics going to college, but, among those that finish high school, a larger share of them are enrolled,” said Dr. Richard Fry, the senior research associate at the Pew Hispanic Trends Project.
