Latino parents raise education as primary issue with Santorum
Senator, speaking at Allentown church, touts Bush program.
Aiming to hear Latinos' concerns, U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum on Monday came to an Allentown Spanish-language
church, where the handful of Latinos who showed up sought solutions to their education woes.
The Pennsylvania Republican visited Iglesia de Dios on N. 10th Street, where the Rev. Eddie Aybar introduced
him to an audience of about 45 people, very few of whom were from the Latino community.
The light showing came a few days after another meeting at the church, organized by the Republican Latino
Committee to educate Latinos on the party's ideals, drew 70 people.
At the Monday event, Aybar told Santorum the main concern among parents in his congregation is the many
obstacles children face in trying to get an education.
Aybar said parents worry that some Latino children are being mistreated by the school system — for
example, being punished or suspended from school unfairly.
''That creates another problem: Parents must leave work'' to deal with the discipline problems, Aybar said.
''That's a problem that worries me as a pastor.''
While praising President Bush's No Child Left Behind legislation, Santorum said he would not speak directly
about local problems in education because they fall under the jurisdiction of the school district.
But he said he believes in giving parents more control over their children's education as opposed to ''bureaucrats
and the experts.''
''What I believe is parents overwhelmingly know what's best for their children,'' Santorum said. He wants
parents to have the choice of transferring their children from low-performing schools to ones that do better.
Parent Luz Papasso, who has two sons at Allen High School, was not satisfied with Santorum's position that
education is a local issue.
She told him that students not only must deal with being suspended from school but also gang violence, crime
and shortages of computers and other resources.
''Educate our children so they can have better lives than their parents,'' Papasso said, arguing that few
Latino residents had come to the meeting ''because all we get is promises.''
Luz Papasso's husband, Giuseppe Papasso, asked the senator what could be done to bring more funding from
Bush's faith-based initiatives to local charities.
''I would like to see more programs come to us,'' Giuseppe Papasso said.
Santorum said many small, religiously inclined social service organizations — some Latino and black
— have had a tough time getting their share of funding because they don't have the technical sophistication to apply
for grants. He said they are also hampered by cultural and language barriers.
The senator said he has spoken with national Latino leaders about how to solve the problem. One idea is
for the government to subcontract the work of identifying grantees to national Latino organizations that know their communities
better.
Asked about immigration, Santorum said he believes in Bush's proposal to give some sort of legal status
to undocumented workers without giving them full citizenship.
''But for immigration,'' he said, ''the population in this country would be declining.''
But he added, ''We need to be able to do it legally.''
After the meeting, some Latino community members did not feel their concerns about education were addressed.
''If it's a local problem, then why do they come here?'' asked Iris Perez, who wasn't chosen to ask her
question during the meeting. ''If there's no way to solve the problems of the students, how are you going to have a good community?''
