Even as Hispanics emerge as an increasingly dominant force our country’s current system of education too often segregates us, denigrates our well-being, destroys our youth, deprives us of opportunity, denudes our community of political power, and steals from too many children the dream of opportunity.

This failure of our system threatens to widen the disparities within our American society, deprive our fastest growing population segment of a bright future, and promises destructive and costly social turmoil for our entire nation. Let there be no doubt that our basic constitutional framework of fundamental rights and freedoms is, today, at great risk.

What does it mean when our country’s largest minority population (and fastest growing) -- a hard-working and talented group -- is 44% functionally illiterate? What does it mean when our system of education produces a Hispanic high school dropout rate of nearly 50% (a dropout rate more than double that of white students)? How does this reality comport with our founding vision of the land of the free and home of the brave? What does our country guarantee if not the fundamental rights of all citizens? The truth is this: if the right to an adequate education for America’s most vulnerable and largest minority population is denied, everyone’s rights are imperiled.

We are the only national public policy Hispanic organization dedicated solely to K-12 education reform, who is willing to speak out on behalf of parents and children. A review of the data and research available, combined with the 2000 census data, confirms the extreme crisis in Hispanic student achievement. Currently, Hispanics are the most undereducated minority group in the United States.

For the last three years, HCREO has developed grassroots efforts in our key states to educate and inform Hispanic parents about their parental rights and available educational options. Ultimately, HCREO works to mobilize Hispanic parents to become advocates for their children’s education. Through extensive research, HCREO has generated a public policy matrix that has identified Arizona,  Florida, Ohio, Connecticut and New Mexico as the most significant states with the potential for school choice reform. Our key states were chosen based on the following criteria: Hispanic population, alarming Hispanic high school dropout rates, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) scores, and the feasibility of school choice reform given the state’s political climate.