Seeking to Serve or $erve? Hispanic-Serving Institutions’ Race-Evasive Pursuit of Racialized Funding

Abstract

This critical qualitative study explores Hispanic-serving institutions’ (HSIs) pursuit of racialized federal funds and theorizes the connection between grant seeking and servingness at HSIs. Specifically, the study’s guiding research question was: Why do HSIs pursue racialized Title V funding? Based on interviews with 23 institutional actors at 12 HSIs, including public Hispanic-serving community colleges and both public and private 4-year institutions, the findings suggest that HSIs vie for Title V grants for assorted and, at times, conflicting reasons. Specifically, they seek this racialized funding to (a) pool money, (b) address broad-based institutional needs, (c) signal legitimacy, and (d) support all students. Importantly, some of the reasons have little to do with immediately serving students generally or Latinx students more specifically. Thus, I argue that in their race-evasive pursuit of Title V funds, many HSIs capitalize on their Latinx students, rendering serving into $erving and ghosting the “H” and “S” in HSIs.

Accountable to whom? Reimagining Hispanic serving institutions’ financial models

“…More transparency is imperative in grant‐awarded HSIs’ pursuit of Latinx‐specific funding. The implementation of race‐evasive spending must be eradicated (Aguilar‐Smith, 2021; Vargas & Villa‐Palomino, 2019). A summary of the implications discussed for researchers and practitioners who engage in HSI funding from an institutional, student, and funder perspective are outlined in Appendix .…”

“…The primary question driving this inquiry is "What accountability is there to those being 'served?'" We amplify the call put out by many scholars (e.g., Aguilar-Smith, 2021;Vargas & Villa-Palomino, 2019) to interrogate the tokenization and race-evasive pursuits of HSI grants and propose practices to re-center Latinx students. We present our argument from the perspectives of students, institutions, and funders to reimagine what accountability could look like if student voices were centered and the true spirit of what "Hispanic-serving" was meant to be is honored.…”

“…The original intention of Title V funding for HSIs was meant to address inequitable learning environments for Latinx students (Valdez, 2015). Institutions however are often utilizing monies awarded to serve the general student population without specific initiatives targeted at the success of Latinx students (Aguilar‐Smith, 2021). We offer examples of how HSIs can reimagine accountability toward more transparency through their budgeting and financing processes around these awarded grants.…”

Learning from the Past to Create an Equitable Future: An Archival Study of a University Emerging as a Hispanic-Serving Institution

“…During Dr. Cheng's tenure at NAU (2014–2021), she spent time encouraging the campus to grow into its emerging HSI status (eHSI) and inferred that Title V funds would arrive alongside the designation (Aguilar-Smith, 2021; Venegas, 2015). Campus partners were less clear what forms of servingness would exist on campus once the school reached HSI status in 2021.…”

Senior-level Leadership in Higher Education: The Latina Experience

“…HSI status allows universities to receive federal grant funding to support and strengthen programming and services for Hispanic Americans and other underrepresented populations (U. S. Department of Education, 2020). Many institutions use this funding to provide accessibility to the Latinx population and increase student academic success rates (Aguilar-Smith, 2021;Capers, 2019). Today, HSIs have increased by 93% in the past ten years, reaching 569 institutions serving 67% of all Latinx students.…”