ASPIRA launches first state chapter; National group aids Hispanic youths.

Byline: Brian Lee 

SOUTHBRIDGE - ASPIRA, the country's largest Hispanic organization, has launched its first Massachusetts chapter.

Founded in 1961, ASPIRA is the only national Hispanic organization dedicated exclusively to developing the educational and leadership capacity of Hispanic youth, said its president, Ronald Blackburn-Moreno.

At Southbridge Town Hall last week, Councilor Richard J. Logan expressed satisfaction that the organization comes to the state through the efforts of citizens in this little-known community, and the citizens exemplify "the Democratic process in action."

ASPIRA has taken under its umbrella Citizens for Latino Educational Equity, a Southbridge organization formed three years ago by parents, educators, lawyers and others concerned that Latino students performed poorly on the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System tests.

ASPIRA's national organization, at its July 1 meeting, approved CLEE's request to become an affiliate, said Fran Fajana, a founding member of CLEE who lives in Worcester and works as a lawyer for the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute in Boston.

The nonprofit ASPIRA serves about 65,000 young people each year. Its national office is in Washington, D.C., and it has chapters in Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Puerto Rico. It plans to open a chapter in South Carolina and has eight charter schools with 7,500 students, Mr. Blackburn-Moreno said.

Luz E. Espino and Elsa M. Rivera of Southbridge will serve as the local chapter's president and vice president, respectively.

ASPIRA, according to Ms. Rivera, "is a movement that has been working for many years at the grass-roots level to provide programs that encourage students to stay in school, prepare them to succeed into the academic arena, develop the leadership skills and to serve the community."

It will bring an after-school program, youth leadership development and parent involvement in curriculum. The hope is to implement MCAS tutoring, college-access assistance and parental support, Ms. Rivera said.

ASPIRA began in New York by a group of Puerto Rican parents and community leaders concerned about education and "the huge dropout rate," Mr. Blackburn-Moreno said. More than 95 percent of its student members finish high school and 90 percent go to college the same year.

The organization has ties with "almost every Latino leader in business and politics" throughout the country, he said.

A chief advocacy effort occurred in the 1970s, when ASPIRA New York won a lawsuit against the largest school district in the country. It has a consent decree giving it control of bilingual education for that district, Mr. Blackburn-Moreno said.

The organization has had difficulty moving into Massachusetts. An ASPIRA launch, he said, has to be organized by a community.

State Rep. Geraldo Alicea, D-Charlton, called it "an important day for Massachusetts as we are reminded that educational parity, justice and equal opportunity benefits all of society."

Mr. Alicea is a Latino who grew up in Southbridge and is a member of the Legislature's Joint Committee on Education.

Maria Idali Torres Ramirez, director of the Mauricio Gaston Institute for Latino Community Development & Public Policy at the University of Massachusetts in Boston, said she hoped ASPIRA would serve as a catalyst for change locally.

Her program met in June with a large group of Southbridge parents and residents, learning about how Latino students are educated.

Ms. Ramirez suggested new policies were needed at the local level, a notion that Southbridge School Superintendent Dale M. Hanley, the next speaker, questioned.

Ms. Hanley pointed to the restructuring of districtwide teaching and learning. Beginning last year, the school system prepared

mainstream classroom teachers to receive students with limited English proficiency. Massachusetts English Proficiency Assessment scores in each of the five schools "soared with restructuring of our program," she said.

"We have 80 percent of our children who have scored in the fourth and fifth level of proficiency on the MEPA that will be mainstreamed in the next couple of weeks," the superintendent said.