Promoting Higher Education: The Latino Achievement Mentoring Program (LAMP)

Statistics suggest that Latino youths are at risk for academic underachievement and withdrawal. Culturally sensitive approaches to supporting school achievement based on the needs of Latino youth and their families must be developed. In response to these needs, the Latino Research Initiative (LRI), a collaborative group with members from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) and the Hispanic Community Center (HCC) created the Latino Achievement Mentoring Program (LAMP). LAMP is a culturally appropriate mentoring program designed to promote school success and post-secondary opportunities for Latino youths. This program provides Latino youths with positive role models and information and guidance about academic life and future school success. Finally, because of the cultural significance of family members among many Latinos, LAMP activities are developed and implemented such that the mentees' family members are involved. This presentation will report the first-year activities of the initial mentor and men tee pairs, with particular emphasis on educational outreach and academic development of the program. Evaluation data will be presented for the first cohort of mentees, including academic information, teacher reports and self-measure findings. LAMP activities aimed at promoting academic success will also be presented. Finally, the experiences of the mentors will briefly be reported.

Reaffirm to Affirm: Enhancing Minority Faculty Development at the PWI

The objective of this roundtable discussion is to examine the preparation of minority faculty as it relates to succeeding in an academic career. Although substantial research has been conducted on faculty preparation (Gaff, 1997; Garcia, 2000, Tice, Gaff, and Pruitt-Logan, 1998), conversations fall short when it comes to ongoing success development of faculty. This discussion will focus primarily on initiatives/plans to encourage the expansion and success of minority faculty at PWI's. For the purposes of this discussion, minority faculty is defined in terms of race/ethnic and gender.