The following article focuses on Latino students’ difficulties with higher education because of dual constructions of identity from and toward the Anglo mainstream. First, the article addresses Other perception: the potential problems Latino students (Mexican Americans) encounter in higher education based on how others perceive their individual and group identity. Second, it addresses self-perception: the contradictory expectations that Mexican Americans have of the mainstream in higher education. The discussion of these issues is presented in a letter format that primarily speaks to audiences outside the mainstream.

In a departure from traditional paradigms, in this work Latinos examine their own experiences in US schools and offer theories born from positions of expertise and first-hand knowledge as researchers and educators.