Growth of Emerging HSIs
According to an Executive Summary published in 2010 by Excelencia in Education, the emerging HSI designation was established to identify institutions “within the critical mass range of 15-24 percent and have the potential to become HSIs in the next few years” (Santiago, 2010). Recent numbers show an increase of emerging HSIs from 146 in 1994-1995 to 412 in the 2022-2023 academic year (Excelencia in Education, 2024). One of the major differences between HSIs and emerging HSIs is that emerging HSIs are not written into federal law, meaning that institutions with a full time Hispanic undergraduate enrollment between 15%-24.99% are not yet eligible for Title V funding from the United States Department of Education. The fact that emerging HSIs do not receive Title V grant funding for being in a stage of growing Hispanic enrollment is significant when considering the degree of institutional awareness that exists or is shared about the designation.
While funding is an important motivation for raising awareness of the designation at a college or university, a lack of funding for being an emerging HSI does not mean that institutions are exempt from doing the work that Marcela Cuellar points out in her discussion on Gina Garcia’s Qué Pasa, HSIs? Podcast. Cuellar calls conceptualizing an emerging HSI as “thinking, dreaming, building, reimagining, and engineering” what the designation means for a college campus. Students are still at our doorstep. Consider, for example, English or Writing Departments at emerging HSIs and the college writing programs they hold. These academic units are crucial, especially since they often serve large swaths of students through the introductory-level writing course. Additionally, first-year writing courses can be connected to how students study language and literacy in relation to their identities, and even the societal structures of power that shape their lives. However, before we dream, build, reimagine, and engineer the eHSI designation, how much awareness do institutions, including administrators, faculty, and staff, have about the designation?
The Problem of Unawareness
In a 2023 IRB-approved research study (González, 2024) that included survey data and interviews with first-year college writing programs at various HSIs and emerging HSIs, data shows that out of 27 college writing program directors at emerging HSIs, 12 interview participants (44%) strongly disagreed that their institution is explicit about its eHSI status. This data contrasts with just 4% of college writing program directors at HSIs who strongly disagreed that their institution is explicit about its status. This data indicates a crucial need to increase knowledge of the designation between administrators and educators, followed by what it means to have an emerging HSI designation in practice. For example, in one survey response, an instructor at a 2-year college in the south mentioned, “I have never seen this title [emerging HSI] mentioned until now. There appears to be no institutional commitment to this designation” (González, 2024). When asked whether the institution’s emerging HSI identity is important for selecting readings in first-year writing, the same participant explained that “some instructors, including myself, try to select readings that Latino students can relate to. Not an institutional or departmental priority.” The above data is significant because it not only points to a lack of awareness and/or communication between organizational levels about being an emerging HSI and what that might mean in practice, it also indicates how, in some cases, faculty are paying attention to the shifting demographics in their courses. However, in what ways are institutions committed to allocating resources and supporting awareness of the designation, as well as defining how to implement it in practice? In other words, there is a need to do the work that Marcela Cuellar calls for – a kind of preparation that can be a crucial space for thinking about what it means to be an emerging HSI and to engineer practices that benefit students before a college campus reaches an HSI designation.
On the other hand, the lack of awareness of an emerging HSI designation is not always synonymous with a lack of awareness of an institution’s shifting student demographics or a program’s perceived incapacity to serve and support students. As one college writing program director at a 4-year private eHSI in the east explained, “until receiving your message [to participate in the study], I was unaware of the category of emerging HSI, and that my institution occupied this position. We are all aware, however, that our student demographics are shifting significantly” (González, 2024). While knowledge of the emerging HSI designation or lack thereof does not always correlate to programmatic or institutional initiatives that support shifting demographics, learning about the emerging HSI designation can be crucial in affirming and acting upon the changes that educators and administrators are collectively witnessing within their institutional ecologies.
What It Means to Embrace the Designation
Raising awareness of the emerging HSI designation is a crucial first step. Various institutional stakeholders, including students, can understand this designation as a collective mandate to embrace an organizational identity that can frame the conditions for servingness in practice. As one instructor from a Historically Black College and University and emerging HSI explained (González, 2024), “I imagine the HSI tag - if we can get that onto the table, some folks in marketing, and the chief academic officers and some other places - I suspect maybe there’ll be an incentive to say, okay, this is something we can own. We can embrace it. We can put a name to this and start actively thinking about what it would mean to better support students.” It is crucial that administrators and educators at emerging HSIs actively name this designation to set the conditions to think, build, reimagine, and engineer it within various units across our institutions.
References
Excelencia in Education. (2024). Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) Infographic: 2022-23. Washington, D.C.: Excelencia in Education.
Garcia, G.A. (Host). (2023, February 5). Campus Climate and Liberatory Outcomes at HSIs (No. 3) [Audio Podcast Episode]. In Qué Pasa, HSIs? GinaSol, Inc. https://www.ginaanngarcia.com/podcast/episode/b51df747/campus-climate-and-liberatory-outcomes-at-hsis.
González, C. L. (2024). Examining the Programmatic Practices of First-Year Composition at Hispanic-Serving Institutions and Emerging Hispanic-Serving Institutions. [Doctoral Dissertation, The Ohio State University]. ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.
Santiago, D.A. (2010 January). Emerging Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs): Serving Latino Students. Excelencia in Education.
https://www.edexcelencia.org/research/issue-
briefs/emerging-hispanic-serving-institutions-hsis-serving-latino-students.
About the author
Caleb González is an Assistant Professor of Rhetoric, Composition, and Literacy at the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley. His research focuses on first-year writing programs at Hispanic-Serving Institutions and emerging Hispanic-Serving Institutions.
