Also see the memorandum on this from Brent Wilkes, National Executive Director and Richard Roybal, LNESC Executive Director to the National LULAC Board on this very topic.
-Angela
LULAC may lose education program funds
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
By MICHELLE MITTELSTADT / The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON – A multimillion-dollar federal grant for a program that steers low-income Hispanic students in Dallas and 16 other cities toward college is on the verge of termination, the League of United Latin American Citizens announced Tuesday.
Nearly 2,500 students in the Dallas area have come through the doors of the LULAC National Educational Service Center in Oak Cliff during the past four years, getting academic counseling and advice about selecting a college, and filling out applications and financial aid forms.
Similar centers in seven other states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico have helped 52,542 students over the past four years, LULAC says.
The counseling and other programs at the centers – including English courses for parents, computer classes and student leadership training – are in jeopardy as a result of the Education Department's apparent decision to cease its 27-year relationship with LULAC, the organization's officials said.
"They are getting a great bargain by contracting with us. We are just flabbergasted that they are thinking about not funding us," said Rey de los Santos, director of the Oak Cliff center. While less than half of the graduates of some Dallas Independent School District schools go on to college, he said, about 80 percent of the center's students enroll in a college program.
The Education Department wouldn't confirm that it is ending its $3.4 million annual grant to LULAC – the largest recipient of Talent Search Program funding. Official notification of the grant awards isn't expected until this week, said Education Department spokesman Jim Bradshaw, who declined to discuss LULAC's status.
But Matthew Looney, national development coordinator for the LULAC centers, said organization officials have been unofficially notified that their funding is being terminated for the upcoming four-year grant cycle. And with the Education Department's grant accounting for two-thirds of the program's budget, it will be very hard to replace that money, he said.
"We are currently exploring ways to downsize each of the centers and see over the next 30, 60, 90 days what kind of operations we can maintain," Mr. Looney said. "Certainly, some of the markets will close outright. And some that are able to secure funds at the local level and the national level will be able to remain open in some form – but they will not be able to serve a fraction of the students they are currently serving."
The centers do what many school districts can't, Mr. de los Santos and other LULAC officials said. At DISD, some schools have a 500-1 ratio of students to counselors, twice the recommended rate, Mr. de los Santos said. "It's not their fault. It's just that they can't get to everybody," he said.
At the LULAC center in Oak Cliff – located in the first store in the 7-Eleven empire, which the Dallas-based chain later donated to the organization – students are rattled.
"I don't want them to take away the money," said Veronica Hernandez, a 15-year-old entering the 10th grade at Yvonne A. Ewell Townview Center. The center is "helping me get started," she said. "It helps me think about my future. And the people here are very nice. It's really, really helpful."
LULAC is making a last-ditch effort to restore the grant.
"We are working with congressional allies and anybody, really, who is willing to listen to us and see how we can attempt to reverse this process," Mr. Looney said.
E-mail mmittelstadt@dallasnews.com


League of United Latin American Citizens
National Office
2000 L Street, NW, Suite 610 Washington, DC 20036 (202) 833-6130 • FAX (202) 833 6135
MEMORANDUM
To: LULAC National Board of Directors
From: Brent Wilkes, National Executive Director
Richard Roybal, LNESC Executive Director
Date: July 28, 2006
Subject: LNESC Talent Search Funding
As you are aware, the LULAC National Educational Service Centers has been funded in large part by the U.S. Department of Education’s Talent Search program since 1979. Periodically, LNESC must apply for new funding through a grant competition administered by the Department. This past December, LNESC submitted a proposal to continue the Talent Search program through its 16-site network serving low income students who are potentially the first in their families to go to college. In addition, LNESC submitted 8 other proposals to open new Talent Search projects.
Unfortunately, we have now learned through our Congressional allies that the Department of Education does not have LNESC listed on the slate of projects funded for the new grant cycle. Although, we have yet to receive official notification from the Department, we expect to hear from them sometime next week.
For the first time, LNESC’s proposal was limited to 75 pages for this grant cycle and while all the other proposals in the competition were limited to 75 pages as well, only the LNESC proposal covered 13 separate Talent Search projects. The vast majority of the other proposals covered only one project. The feedback we are receiving is that the 75 page limit did not give LNESC adequate space to describe the need of our 16 distinct target areas and the unique programming each center brings to their communities. In prior years, the proposal numbered over 1,000 pages and contained detailed information about the need in the target areas and programs operated by each center. However, the bottom line is that we won’t know exactly why LNESC did not receive funding until we get the proposal scores back from the Department which may take several weeks.
Nevertheless, the LNESC and LULAC staff are taking immediate action to pressure the Department to reconsider its decision. Already we have met with Ruben Barrales, the Director of Inter-governmental Affairs at the White House and Kathleen Leos, Assistant Deputy Secretary and Director for the Office of English Language Acquisition at the Department of Education and asked for their immediate personal intervention. We have been in contact with Sen. Boxer, Sen. Feinstein, and Sen. Reid’s offices and they in turn have contacted the Department to express their concern and ask for an explanation as to why LNESC would not receive funding.
In addition, we are contacting every single member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Conference as well as every member of Congress whose district or state is served by an LNESC center. We are asking them to champion our cause and to contact Education Secretary Margaret Spellings and pressure her to reverse the Department’s decision. Congressman Hinajosa’s staff has scheduled a meeting on Monday to rally the support of the Hispanic members of Congress behind LNESC and to discuss the best strategies to secure refunding.
This weekend we plan to launch a grass-roots campaign to have our members, program participants, corporate partners, and allies on both sides of the aisle contact their members of Congress, the Department of Education, and the White House and urge them to save LNESC. We are currently developing a web site www.SaveLNESC.org
We are also exploring the possibility of obtaining discretionary funding and/or a legislative earmark for LNESC that will keep the centers in operation, should our efforts to get the Department to reconsider the grant fail.
Most important, we will need your full support as a member of the LULAC National Board of Directors to help us make calls to Congress, the Department of Education and the White House and to rally our members and friends to support LNESC. This is not the first time we have faced a funding challenge to our educational centers, but each time, through our collective efforts, we have been able to maintain and, in fact, grow the funding of our centers.
We will be contacting you individually to develop Congressional target lists and our grass roots strategy in your region. Thank you for your full support.
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