Throughout my life, the Good Lord has blessed me with many wonderful people: my wife and children, my mom, my beautiful grandparents, good friends, and now my all-time new treasure, my grandkids. However, I can never thank the Good Lord enough for a group of wonderful ladies he put in my life as a growing kid at my old San Jose Catholic School ­ the Sisters of St. Mary of Numur.

These beautiful nuns instilled in me, and my American Hispanic student chums in our minds that we were just as good and could attain whatever goals we wanted to achieve in our lives. And by golly there were going to see to it that they would arm us with a good education to get us out of the farm fields and packing houses where most of our parents labored then to make a living. "Kids, your brains are just as good as those of the white kids," I remember Sister Lawrencia telling us whenever we would go challenge a mostly all-white student body public school near our Catholic School to a Spelling Bee Contest. Yes ladies and gentlemen our 100 percent Hispanic student body almost always would be victorious in such scholastic confrontations. I also vividly remember how the nuns saw that we learned to articulate and to speak English correctly. During those days (early 50s) the Zoot Suit slang vernacular and mode of dress (peg pants, long coats, watch chains, etc.) were very popular among Hispanics. But at San Jose the nuns didn’t tolerate such nonsense. I remember how the nuns would walk beside the desks where the boys sat and combed out their then stylish hair ducktails. If any student would be disorderly in class, the nuns would send the unruly student home with a note that had to be signed and returned by a parent. That note to one’s parents was enough incentive for students to walk a straight line. Most of us knew what awaited us a home if we took a note sent by a nun ­ a good spanking! Though the nuns were strict and loaded us up with lots of homework, I can’t remember a parent complaining about the nun’s mode of teaching. To the contrary, they wholeheartedly supported the nuns for teaching us our religion and grueling us with school studies.

For many years I’ve noticed that high schools that have a large number of Hispanic or African American students, have dismal scholastic records. "What is it with these Hispanic and black students that can’t cut the mustard?" I’ve often asked myself. "Don’t they have a brain like everyone else? Or, are they born with a genetic gene that impairs them to learn?" I continue to search for an answer. Also, I recently read that within a few years, Hispanics will outnumber whites and blacks in the United States. Many politicians, particularly Democrats, most certainly welcome that. As for me, I find that prediction sort of scary. Listen folks, who in their right mind want the largest group represented in the United States to be a bunch of high school dropouts who can’t learn to read or write? I for one don’t!

As I ponder as to why Hispanic and black students don’t do so well in school, I then wonder who do we blame. Is it the teacher’s fault? Are they a bunch of rejects who can’t cut it in predominately white schools and thus sent to teach Hispanic and black students? Is it the school buildings where they attend? Are they dilapidated, and possibly cold in the winter and hot in the summer making it difficult for students to learn under such dire conditions? Could it be the curriculum? But wait a minute here; aren’t all schools given the same books in the public school system throughout the state? Could it be the low income of their parents that causes them not to learn? Again, wait a minute here, most of the kids at my old Catholic School were Hispanic and dirt poor and we learned our multiplication tables, how to spell, how to read, how to do algebra, what a pronoun, noun, adverb, adjective was. Certainly, there has to be a reason as to why these Hispanic and black students of today can’t learn. Anybody out there have any answers?

In my opening remarks I stated that our parents back when I was in school supported the nuns wholeheartedly to discipline us and make us learn. Today, many, but no all parents of Hispanic and black students go to school when their kids are discipline and raise hell with the teachers. This I know because I have several teacher friends who teach at several predominately Hispanic and black schools and often are verbally assaulted by Hispanic and black parents when they discipline one of their kids. Secondly, when I was in school, my parents saw to it that we do our homework before we went out to play, or before we went to bed. If I brought home a bad report card, my mom and dad would not let me go to the movies for 2 weeks -- something that I dearly loved to do when I was a kid. Thus, I tried hard to make good grades.

My final analysis of why Hispanic and black students have poor scholastic ratings when compared to white students ­ in almost all cases you can blame the parents. They, along with the under achieving kids, deserve a big F!