Senator PELL. Mr. Ramirez, will you draw up a chair and join the panel? If you have a brief statement to make, we will be glad to hear it.

Senator MONDALE. Mr. Chairman, permit me to say that I am personally grateful to you for holding these hearings on MexicanAmerican education as part of this study of President's Emergency Act. I think this testimony shows why we must be far more fully aware and responsive to these problems than we have been in the past.

Mr. Ramirez is the head of the staff of the Civil Rights Commission dealing with this area we are considering this morning. I think his testimony is critically important to us.

Senator PELL. In making your statement, you will be speaking as a private citizen, or do you speak for the Commission?

STATEMENT OF HENRY RAMIREZ, CHIEF OF THE MEXICANAMERICAN STUDIES DIVISION, U.S. COMMISSION ON CIVIL RIGHTS

Mr. RAMIREZ. The truth is that I did not come prepared with a statement. I am not sure in what role or capacity I am speaking.

My name is Henry Ramirez. I am Chief of the Mexican-American Division at the Civil Rights Commission, where we have been engaged in studies that are now a little over a year old to determine and assess what is the state of education of the Mexican American today.

So, we are looking into a very wide-ranging field of elements in the educational world in the Southwest. Our survey went to about 76 percent of all the Mexican-American students in the Southwest. It went to all districts that had 10 percent or more Spanish surnames. This was about 540 districts. Within those districts another questionnaire went to the school principal. This was about 1,200 schools that were involved.

The information that we acquired came directly from principals and superintendents, and in many cases teachers. The information was a very severe eye opener in terms of what is the status of education for the Mexican American today. Some of the basic things that we have found thus far-we have not issued any reports as yet, although we are on the verge of doing that-are that the educational deprivation of the Mexican American is much more severe than that of, in many cases, the American Indian, the black and the Anglo, whether you talk about dropouts, achievement, financial support, the preparation of the teachers, or segregation.

About 43 percent of all Mexican-American students in the Southwest attend schools that are 50 percent or more Mexican American. Three hundred thousand attend schools that are 80 percent or more Mexican American. Of course, in elementary schools the figure is even higher. We find that ethnic isolation exists not only within the school districts where students may attend what may be called the Mexican school, but we find it to exist in a different way, a way different from that which the blacks have had, in that there are districts that are Mexican districts and these may be found in metropolitan areas such as Dr. Cardenas told us a while ago in terms of Edgewood.

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We will find this in Fresno, we will find it in Orange County, we will find it in Phoenix, and many other places, even in small towns where in one small town there will be two districts. One will be the Mexican district. One will be the Anglo district.

I did not come to give you statistics. I did not know I was going to be asked to provide some of these basic facts. In terms of faculty, the Mexican-American faculty, there are only about 11,000 teachers in the Southwest out of about 350,000 total. To be precise, 3.6 percent of all the teachers in the Southwest are Mexican. The number of Negro teachers are two to one.

In terms of board members, Mexican-American board members are really very few in number. If you go to districts in California, for example, that have a majority of Mexican Americans in them, rarely— in fact, in only two cases-do Mexican Americans compose the majority. In most other districts they are not even there to be seen. There are about 44 districts in the whole Southwest that are 80 percent or more Mexican American. That gives you the picture in terms of isolation. Most of the Mexican-American teachers are assigned to MexicanAmerican schools. California always has to be very different in this respect in that principals of Spanish surname in California generally tend to be assigned across the board, which is 10 percent Mexican American school or 20 percent or 50 percent or 80 percent. Likewise. teachers tend to be assigned across the board in California. But not so in the rest of the Southwest.

In terms of achievement, we find that the reading rates of Mexican American students are terribly behind that of other groups. We find that the rate of dropout is such that of the 1.4 million Mexican American students in school today, a very conservative figure, extremely conservative-and this is the figure the superintendents gave us is that half of them will never see the 12th grade.

I am reminded of a story that one of our staff just brought back to us from a town called Guadalupe in California, where he had witnessed a graduation ceremony of eighth graders. When he asked why there was so much pomp and circumstance attached to an eighth grade graduation-it took place in the local theater-the response of the principal was that "We have to make it big, we have to make it beautiful, because this is probably the last graduation these children will ever

see.'

We find also that in every State and in almost every district there are principals, contrary to school district policy, that have a practice of suppressing the use of the native tongue of these students. The suppression methods vary from harassment sometimes to corporal punishment, sometimes to the use of other students to correct those who use the wrong language. We find this suppression of culture goes throughout the school life. For example, about a year ago I had an opportunity to talk to a superintendent here in Washington who was visiting from New Mexico. We were at a very lovely banquet where we were entertained by a few guitarists singing some beautiful Mexican songs. And the man just sat back and opened his chest up and said "La musica es mi vida." "It is the music of my life, that music just turns me on, there is nothing like it."

I asked him, "Well, you are superintendent of a very large district which is almost a hundred percent Mexican American. You find this

music to be beautiful? You find it is consistent with your culture and things that you love, and you have all these kids who, I am sure, also enjoy it." Then I asked him, "I am sure you must bring that kind of music into your school life and your school curriculum for the students?"?

His reaction was immediate. He sat back very quickly, stiffened his back and said, "No, we can't do that, that is un-American."

Those kinds of activities we at this time cannot measure, but we are measuring the extent to which schools do provide for these cultural activities, do provide for the social life of the student in terms of his background.

Now I am talking in generalities, I am sorry that I don't have the specifics to give you, but we do know that Mexican American students in segregated schools do not achieve as well as those who are in integrated schools. That, our information has shown positively.

We find that segregated Mexican American schools receive less money than the integrated. That, we can demonstrate very clearly. Senator PELL. Could you submit some documentation backing these statements up? They would be helpful.

Mr. RAMIREZ. Well, the Civil Rights Commission will be issuing these in a matter of a month now.

Mr. RUIZ. They are presently unreleased.

Senator KENNEDY. As I understand, that would include what they have been able to determine about the distribution of title I funds as well?

Senator PELL. This is beyond your responsibility right now, is it not? We would appreciate any documentation of the statement you have made. We would like to have them as an aid when we mark up the bill, which could take place in a couple of weeks.

Mr. RAMIREZ. I will try to do so.

Senator KENNEDY. Mr. Chairman.

In terms of the allocation of the resources, the expenditures of Federal funds, do you have the figures available to the Commission which would indicate that less title I funds have gone to the Spanish speaking areas, the Spanish speaking schools in other areas of the State of Texas?

Mr. CARDENAS. In specifics as related to the school district I cited, the case of Edgewood, which is predominantly Mexican American, the distribution of title I funds is on the basis of the 1960 census. Mexican Americans were not counted in the 1960 census. In this school district, we have 12,000 disadvantaged children. The allocation is for 2,927. So, less than one-fourth of the children that qualified under economic deprivation are receiving title I funds.

Senator KENNEDY. I was thinking not only in terms of the interpretation of the census figures, but as well the matter of the policy under which the resources or funds for one reason or another are diverted from these areas. I was wondering what the Civil Rights Commission had been able to determine on this point.

Mr. Ruiz. Mr. Glickstein, our staff director, who testified here a couple of weeks ago, as part of his testimony and in referring to title. I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act affirmatively stated that it had been ineffective in spite of the enormous appropriations, because the funds were so diluted.

So that may be a partial answer.

Senator KENNEDY. That is part of it. Not only because of the dilution of it, but I was wondering if there has been diversion or at least a holding back of the funds that are available from these school areas and school districts. I was wondering if the Commission itself had been able to determine this.

Mr. RAMIREZ. We have not been able to determine that yet for several reasons. One, we are a very poor commission and didn't have the money with which to prepare this information. We are now in the process of contracting with an individual to prepare this for us. We have the data in our files. I believe the data will demonstrate and the data specifically refers to the Federal funds received by districts.

We will be able to separate out by districts the extent to which they receive Federal funds. We will be able to provide a clear picture. But not specifically in terms of title I.

NECESSITY OF LEGISLATION

Senator PELL. I would like to ask one direct question to each of you. If we have a choice between passing this legislation with the Mondale type of tightening up amendment, as we did for the $150 million, would you recommend that we pass it or not? What would you say? Mr. REYNOSO. Yes.

Mr. Ruiz. If the additional funds are available, yes. Because that would be two different parts to the same bill.

Senator PELL. But if we pass the $1,350 million along the same guidelines as the $130 million would you recommend passage or not? Mr. Ruiz. Yes, it would be nationwide in impact instead of sectional. Mr. CARDENAS. I would recommend it be passed as amended. Senator PELL. What would you say, Mr. Ramirez?

Mr. RAMIREZ. I concur fully.

Senator PELL. Thank you.

Mr. Ruiz. I understand that title VI review teams can give us the information with respect to title I. I was just informed of that.

Senator PELL. If we are faced with a situation, and I hope we are not, where we could not get Mondale-type amendments accepted and we were left with the bill introduced by the administration, do you think we would be better off to pass it or not?

Again, I would like to ask each of you. Mr. Reynoso?

Mr. REYNOSO. The answer would be no, and I have two footnotes. I understood that the title IV people are supposed to enforce this. I understand further, there are simply no Spanish-speaking personnel there with the exception of one, I understand, in the Washington office. Two, the Justice Department, after 16 years, has entered one case dealing with the segregation of Spanish speaking. So I would consider it a political payoff to those districts the administration wants to reward and would vote no.

Mr. Ruiz. I will reecho the words of Mr. Reynoso.
Mr. CARDENAS. I will go along with that, sir.
Senator PELL. Mr. Ramirez?

Mr. RAMIREZ. Very definitely not.