Majority of Clark County students are nonwhite

Friday, Nov. 17, 2000 | 10:54 a.m.

If the Clark County School District were to categorize students by just two groups -- white and other -- whites for the first time ever would be the minority.

According to current school enrollment records, 50.1 percent of the 231,125 local public school students are nonwhite. Whites still comprise the vast majority of any race with 49.9 percent, but the tremendous growth of Hispanics -- a tenfold increase in the past 15 years -- has surged the other races as a whole into the majority, the district says.

These are practically meaningless facts that won't translate into much extra funding, but will -- some school officials fear -- be used by some to fuel racial and ethnic misunderstanding and hamper efforts to promote diversity.

"My fear is that stories like this perpetuate an unfair mental picture that all of these Hispanic people are running around the valley and can't speak English -- and that's just not true," said Tom Rodriguez, the school district's executive manager of diversity and affirmative action programs.

"We are talking about a large number of second- and third-generation Hispanic-Americans who speak fluent English. Yes, there will be some need for more language courses than we already have, but it won't be appreciable."

Rodriguez says people with difficulty accepting such ethnic shifts better get used to it.

"These people are the new Americans and will adopt our values system," he said. "My parents came from Mexico, but I come from Kansas and I'm as American as anyone. I fought for this country.

"Hysteria that this large 'invasion' of Hispanics will erode our American traditions is the same unfounded fear that Americans had when the Italians and Irish and others immigrated here in the prior centuries."

While school enrollment has more than doubled in the last 15 years, student populations of all groups have grown significantly

While whites comprised 72.4 percent of all students 15 years ago and today make up less than 50 percent, the white student population actually has doubled -- from 65,031 in the 1985-86 school year to 115,332 today, the district says.

In the 1985-86 school year, Hispanics comprised just 7.2 percent of the nearly 90,000 students in the district -- 6,463 students -- but that figure has skyrocketed to 28.8 percent this year, or 66,564 students, the district says.

As for the other groups, blacks, which comprised 15.3 percent of students in 1985 and 13.8 percent today, increased from 13,756 in 1985 to 31,895 now; Asians, which comprised 3.4 percent of students in 1985, has quadrupled from 3,082 to 15,254 or 6.6 percent; local American Indian students during the same period went from 615 to 2,080 -- just under 1 percent, the district says.

Interestingly enough, the "other" category that existed in 1985-88 and comprised on average about 1 percent of all students -- 833 in 1985-86 to 1,265 in 1987-88 -- disappeared in the 1988-89 school year. School officials say that students today are categorized in just the five main groups.

Rodriguez said that funding for Clark County students -- Hispanic, white or whatever -- is $1,000 per pupil below the national average. And, he said, having a larger percentage of minorities won't help get more federal funding.

That money will have to come from a larger allocation by the Nevada Legislature, Rodriguez said.