Generation Next reports that 70 percent of white third-graders in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region are proficient in reading, while only 38 percent of students of color meet that threshold.
“More than 1 million people in our state are people of color,” said Craig Helmstetter, Compass project director. About 3 million people live in the Twin Cities metro area, and about 762,000 are people of color.
“Since 1990 the population of color has accounted for nearly all of the growth in Minnesota’s population,” Compass reported. Between 1990 and 2014, Minnesota’s non-Hispanic white population increased by 8 percent, while the population of color skyrocketed by 270 percent.
Because of that dramatic population growth, many immigrant-led organizations are tackling school achievement and employment gaps.