The (Re)production of Racialized Inequality among Hispanic-Serving Institutions: A Study of Forms of Capital Mobilized in the Competitive Grantscape

Abstract: Concerned by competitive grantmaking’s role in the racialized (re) production of inequality, we applied a Bourdieusan lens and postsecondary racial neoliberalism to examine Title V—a competitive, federal grant program for Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs) poised to mitigate racially patterned funding inequality. Specifically, employing a critical qualitative methodological approach, we interviewed 29 institutional actors across 17 HSIs and showed that even an equity-aspiring program like Title V could (re)produce inequality among HSIs and magnify the racialized stratification of resources across the field, particularly given the institutional and resource diversity among HSIs. Precisely, seemingly at odds with Title V’s goals and the possibilities of Hispanic-servingness, this neoliberal program is set to privilege places with better grant-related infrastructure, more money, and other less tangible resources (e.g., grantisan knowledge). To better realize this federal investment’s transformative potential, we emphasize implications for public policy and offer possibilities for HSI scholars and practitioners, particularly in grant development and administration.

Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), institutions that enroll at least 25% Hispanic students, are institutionally diverse, including a much wider array of institutional types than other Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs). Furthermore, they have distinctive institutional characteristics from those typically emphasized in institutional typologies such as the Carnegie classification system. To understand better the heterogeneity among HSIs based on their unique institutional qualities, we constructed a conceptual model based on existing theoretical frameworks and empirical research to describe and differentiate among HSIs. Using cluster analysis to examine a population of U.S. mainland and Puerto Rican 2-year and 4-year HSIs in the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), we identified six types of HSIs. This typology helps to place HSIs within the broader landscape of U.S. higher education institutions, provides a foundation for understanding institutional diversity among HSIs, and offers insights about classifying other MSIs and broad access institutions. In an era of increasing accountability, it also provides a tool to identify peer institutions for HSIs, to inform decisions about the extent to which practices at certain HSIs might be applicable to other institutions, and to compare the performance across institutions in more contextually appropriate ways.

Reviewed by: Hispanic-Serving Institutions: Advancing Research and Transformative Practice ed. by Anne-Marie Núñez, Sylvia Hurtado, & Emily Calderón Galdeano Deryl K. Hatch Anne-Marie Núñez, Sylvia Hurtado, & Emily Calderón Galdeano (Eds.). Hispanic-Serving Institutions: Advancing Research and Transformative Practice. New York, NY: Routledge, 2015. 228 pp. Paper: $47.95. ISBN-10: 1138814318. Institutions, just as the people who create them, inevitably change. What we believe describes and drives that change and what it means for everyone involved depends largely on our values and points of reference. In this edited volume, Núñez, Hurtado, and Calderón Galdeano invite readers to question prevailing ontological and epistemological assumptions regarding one of the most widespread, but least understood, institutional changes in higher education in the United States: a proliferation in the number of colleges and universities designated by the federal government as Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) that has coincided with the remarkable growth in the Hispanic population. In contrast to fellow Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs; e.g., Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Tribal Colleges and Universities), HSIs were not founded—with only a few exceptions—to serve any particular group at all. Rather, all not-for-profit institutions of higher education can receive a federal HSI designation when they cross the threshold of 25% Latina/os among enrolled students, regardless of whether or not they choose to embrace that designation. This process is playing out among all sectors, sizes, and types of postsecondary institutions throughout the United States. Núñez, Hurtado, and Calderón Galdeano report that the 370 current HSIs represent 11% of all U.S. colleges and enroll 18% of all college students, a number set to increase with another 277 emerging HSIs (colleges with between 15% and 24% Latina/o student enrollment) that researchers have identified (Calderón Galdeano & Santiago, 2014). Yet their numerical growth and ubiquity, the authors of this book contend, contrasts sharply with how little we know of their diversity and potential to transform the national higher education landscape. Part of the problem, the authors argue, is that HSIs are too often studied as a monolithic block despite their institutional diversity and that limitations to data completeness and reliability [End Page 312] complicate the ability to sufficiently identify and describe HSIs, not the least of which is a lack of any official list. Relatively low persistence and graduation rates have led to “questions about the extent to which HSIs are actually serving versus merely enrolling Latina/o students” (p. 66, emphasis in the original); this despite the “possibility that, rather than inhibiting student success, HSIs are actually doing ‘more with less’” (p. 67). In response to such critiques and limitations among others, the book synthesizes the research literature to date and aims to “advance the study of HSIs as complex organizations as they undergo change and respond to external pressures, including demographic change, increased institutional accountability, and resource constraints” (pp. 2–3), phenomena that are observably shared by higher education institutions everywhere. Following an introductory chapter by the editors in which they provide a historical, socio-political, and theoretical context for the development and study of HSIs, the book is divided into three parts: (1) “Contextualizing the Culture, Structure, and Identity of Hispanic-Serving Institutions,” (2) “Framing Institutional Actors and Experiences Within Hispanic-Serving Institutions,” and (3) “Building Capacity and Accountability in Hispanic-Serving Institutions.” These division titles are broad-reaching, and so it takes time browsing the chapters to get a good sense of the relationship among them. An important key to understanding the book’s organization and approach is that all its chapters primarily “use an organizational lens to understand HSIs, gaining insights from constituencies (students, faculty, and leaders) within them” (p. 13). In this light, the three parts correspond essentially to concerns of institutional identity (the what), experiences (the who), and capacity/impact (the how). In addition to an organizational lens, the book is designed to bring to bear transformative paradigms that go beyond familiar post-positivist, constructivist, and pragmatic paradigms in order to question the “dominant research narrative, based on selective, four-year institutions, and the transference of unquestioned assumptions about definitions of institutional ‘success’ and the...

Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), institutions that enroll at least 25% Hispanic students, are institutionally diverse, including a much wider array of institutional types than other Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs). Furthermore, they have distinctive institutional characteristics from those typically emphasized in institutional typologies such as the Carnegie classification system. To understand better the heterogeneity among HSIs based on their unique institutional qualities, we constructed a conceptual model based on existing theoretical frameworks and empirical research to describe and differentiate among HSIs. Using cluster analysis to examine a population of U.S. mainland and Puerto Rican 2-year and 4-year HSIs in the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), we identified six types of HSIs. This typology helps to place HSIs within the broader landscape of U.S. higher education institutions, provides a foundation for understanding institutional diversity among HSIs, and offers ...

The purpose of this study is to examine what the Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) designation means to Hispanic college students at a Research One four-year university. This qualitative case study used one-on-one interviews with Hispanic undergraduate and graduate students to explore their experiences and perceptions of what it means to be an HSI and how the HSI designation can affect their collegiate experience. The study was guided by Museus’s culturally engaging campus environments model to help identify what strategies can enhance the educational experiences of Hispanic students attending an HSI. The findings of this paper only include data from students of this particular HSI. The overarching themes that emerged include a sense of belonging through campus organizations, the presence of Latina/o/x faculty, and institutional diversity.

Public Hispanic serving institutions (HSIs) play a prominent role in educating racially minoritized students, thus making them valuable sites for examining higher education increased attention to state and institution-level diversity policy and plans. Institutional diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) plans, serve as public statements regarding institutional priorities, illuminate how racial equity is centered or decentered. This research engages 10 Equity Reports at public two-year and four-year HSIs in Florida. Through the lens of critical race theory and LatCrit, the analysis foregrounds patterns regarding institutional discourse, in response to state policy mandates, considering the intersection of HSI designation and institutional type. The findings illustrate how the Equity Reports decenter racial equity, reflect a sparse substantive mention of Latinx students, and only superficially engages with the HSIs designation. The findings expand the analysis of HSIs to a new sociopolitical context, providing a broader view of HSIs, and provide policymakers and implementers with tools to consider racial equity through DEI policy.

The Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) was funded by the Department of Energy (DOE) to strengthen and expand the participation of Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs) in the FEDIX and MOLIS database systems begun in February of 1994. The project was a collaborative effort with Federal Information, Inc. (now named RAMS-FIE, Inc.), which maintains the FEDIX/MOLIS databases. The original purpose of the DOE/HACU Connections project was to expand the participation of HSIs in the MOLIS database, to train HSI faculty and staff on FEDIX and MOLIS, and to increase the use of the FEDIX database by HSIs. The expanded participation of HSIs provided their faculty, administrators, and students the opportunity to learn about the wide variety of DOE and other participating federal agencies research, contract, grant, and educational programs information available on FEDIX. Similarly, the expanded participation of HSIs provided DOE and other participating federal agencies with greater information regarding HSI research and training capabilities and interests. A key outcome of this DOE/HACU effort was the impact of the training provided to the HSI faculty and administrators. Recent studies, including one by HACU, Improving Utilization of the Information Highway by Hispanic Serving Institutions, indicate that the Hispanic community as a whole and the HSIs have significantly less access to the Internet and computers than the majority of other institutions of Higher Education (IHEs). Thus the training offered by the project at HSIs served both to introduce the opportunities on FEDIX/MOLIS and to highlight the opportunities on the Internet as well as highlight the lack of telecommunication technology resources.

While scholars agree that enrolling a large percentage of Latinx students is not enough for postsecondary institutions to be considered “Latinx-serving,” there continues to be a debate about what it means for institutions to have an organizational identity for serving this population. The Typology of HSI Organizational Identities is a guiding framework that suggests there are multiple ways for an institution to serve Latinx students, and thus multiple “types” of Hispanic- Serving Institutions (HSIs). The typology considers academic and non-academic outcomes for Latinx students as well as the institution’s ability to provide a culture that enhances their racial/ethnic experience. In this study, I used the typology to classify four HSIs and two emerging HSIs in the Midwest, a geographic area in the United States with a growing population of Latinxs and HSIs. I drew on secondary data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) and primary data from institutional websites. In doing so, I sought to test the utility of the typology for classifying institutions for research, practice, and policy, and found that it is a useful tool for looking at how postsecondary institutions may serve Latinx students beyond enrollment. Implications for research, practice, and policy are discussed.

Researchers have explored a variety of topics related to the finances of Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI), including how HSIs are funded and how HSI graduates fare in the labor market, including salary analyses. Related to staff and faculty, researchers have found that low salaries are a primary reason for faculty and staff to leave. However, no empirical work has explored whether there are salary inequities between staff and faculty working in HSIs and non-HSIs. As a result, this study leverages current Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) data to explore salary differences between faculty (multiple ranks) and staff (multiple classifications) at HSIs and non-HSI peer institutions. Quantitative analyses suggest that HSI staff and faculty salaries are comparable with non-HSI salaries, yet controlling for institutional sector and level does reveal many salary inequities. Moreover, regression analyses reveal breakpoints when HSI salaries decrease as Hispanic student enrollment increases. Implications for research, policy, and practice are addressed, especially as they relate to federal funding mechanisms and private industry partnerships that could help provide HSIs with the financial support they deserve to compensate HSI faculty and staff, especially Latinx-identifying faculty and staff, equitably.

This study examined the persistence of first-year engineering students at a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) and a Historically Black College and University (HBCU) pre- and mid-COVID-19 interruptions and whether their characteristics (race/ethnicity, financial need status, first-generation status, SAT scores) predicted their persistence. Using logistic regression, we compared the persistence of three cohorts (i.e. cohorts 1 and 2: pre-COVID-19 cohorts; cohort 3: mid-COVID-19 cohort) at both institutions. Before adjusting for student characteristics, the logistic regression results indicated students in the mid-COVID-19 cohorts had better persistence than most pre-COVID-19 cohorts at the HSI and HBCU. Additionally, at both institutions, after controlling for the variables in the model and regardless of cohort, students with higher SAT math scores (HSI) and higher SAT composite scores (HBCU) were more likely to persist in engineering. Also, after controlling for other variables in the models, persistence was not related to financial need or first-generation status, and these relationships were consistent across cohorts and institutions. Implications and limitations are discussed.

Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) serve over 63 percent of the Latine undergraduate population in the United States. While a growing literature examines how HSIs can successfully serve Latine students, few have gained an emic view from Latine students on how institutions should define servingness at HSIs and support their holistic student success. This study utilized a photovoice methodology to gain an emic perspective on institutional servingness with Latine undergraduate students (n = 9) at a HSI in Northern California. Student co-researchers identified eight themes that emerged over thirteen 3-hour sessions. The eight themes include representative photos and narratives that point to a critical, holistic definition of Latine student success at HSIs. These include a discussion of perceptions of belonging and experiences of discrimination, recognition of positive intentions by the university, and need for greater representation and Latine student empowerment by universities. Policy and practice implications are discussed.

This chapter examines the experiences of queer Latinx men at Hispanic-serving institutions. Approximately 22% of Latinx millennials reported holding an LGBTQ identity. As new generations of students enroll in institutions of higher education, administrators are seeing an increase in the acceptance of queer students and the expectation for inclusive policies and services. With the campus climate playing a role in engagement and academic performance for both queer students and Latinx students, institutional diversity and support for queer Latinx men are important. The policy implications include increasing representation of faculty and staff who hold Latinx and queer identities, addressing lack of awareness of resources, and addressing the impact racial/ethnic and queer discrimination have on the campus climate.

Institutional diversity and support for queer Hispanic men is an important component of postsecondary education. While some postsecondary institutions have worked to become more inclusive, queer students continue to experience harassment and discrimination. Guided by the Unifying Model of Sexual Identity Development, the Model of Multiple Dimensions of Identity, and concepts of servingness, this study explored the perceptions of queer Hispanic men on whether HSIs serve their needs based on the intersecting identities they hold. Strategies for rethinking the HSI designation and developing intentional programs and policies to support both queer Hispanic students at Hispanic-serving institutions are presented.

Guided by a strength-based framework and counter-storying lens, we use a qualitative case study approach (Cook-Sather, 2020; Cook-Sather & Motz-Storey, 2016; Lechuga-Peña & Lechuga, 2018) to explore students’ and instructors’ experiences with a students as learners and teachers (SaLT) partnership program at a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI). This study includes five students and five faculty members who participated in the student-faculty partnership program. Data collection involved student partners’ self-assessment reflections and faculty members’ pre- and post-program reflections on their experiences. Several themes were identified following a phenomenological analysis of students’ and faculty partners’ self-reflections. Themes emerging from student participants included empathy, personal growth, solidarity, and feedback awareness. Faculty partners’ themes included receptivity, resistance, and collaboration. Implications for institutions of higher education and HSIs are provided.

Research on student success is replete with studies showing that academic advisors play a vital role in shaping students' achievement, tenacity, and persistence (Hatch & Garcia, 2017; Hunter & White, 2004; Kuh et al., 2005; Kuhn, 2008; Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005; Strayhorn, 2015). Using the multidimensional conceptual framework of servingness in HSIs (Garcia et al., 2019) as a lens, I conducted a collaborative action research study that examined an academic advising model that was recently launched at a large, public, four-year Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI). Specifically, the purpose of this study was to examine the experiences of advisors who are part of the holistic care advising model (HCAM) and how they incorporated advising practices that align with indicators of servingness. In total, my action research study consisted of one pre-cycle and four cycles of data collection over a period of five months. Primary data sources included three focus groups with six professional advisors, two males and four females, ranging from 28 to 45 years old, who were part of the HCAM. Supplemental data included a survey, as well as an institutional audit and review of public records regarding the institution's HSI designation and advising practices (e.g., newspaper articles, institutional reports and webinars, websites, etc.). Through the collaborative action research cycles and the data analysis process, five servingness advising practices as themes emerged, as well as validating experiences and racialized experiences from the perspective of the advisors. More specifically, findings detail the ways mentoring and support groups for Holistic Care Advisors (HCAs) provided space for transformational resistance and collaborative action. Despite serving within an HSI, HCAs faced challenges rooted in White-centric ideologies and hierarchies, with academic affairs personnel viewed as more knowledgeable and respected. My findings emphasize the essential needs of HCAs and the importance of continuous mentorship, support, and collaboration among advising professionals. Overall, this study outlines specific strategies that can be used to facilitate the continued professional development of advisors in the field with implications for policy and practice.