<p>Hi, entomom. Thanks so much for your incredible hard work on this forum! What would we do without you?</p>
<p>Your statement above that Spaniards are the “least underrepresented in college” threw me for a loop. My daughter is Spanish by birth, lived in Spain till she was eight, and her dad is Spanish. Here in California, Spaniards are few and far between; we only ever come across the very occasional tourist. I can’t imagine there are many Spaniards enrolled in colleges across the US, either. Remember, the population of Spain is only 40 million, not much more than the population of the state of California.</p>
<p>My daughter has a strong sense of her cultural and linguistic “otherness,” and in that sense, I think she would definitely add diversity to the mix of students at her future college. Furthermore, I often see the statistics published by schools which break down the total number of international and dual-national students enrolled, and the different countries represented. I can’t help thinking, therefore, that colleges must value Spanish students if for no other reason than to up their statistics on international students. Granted, this may only hold true when the Spaniard or his parent(s) are foreign-born, thus giving the student Spanish nationality. However, colleges can also add Spanish students to the overall percentage numbers for Hispanics in general, which reflects well on the institution in terms of higher diversity stats.</p>