President Ignacio Salazar's Conference Speech

January 19, 2012

46th Annual SER National Conference - October 25-26th, Albuquerque, NM

Over the past few days, we have recognized, shared stories about, and paid tribute to the many forces that come together to make the efforts of SER possible. First and foremost among these forces is the vision and dedication of our founders, LULAC and the American GI Forum. The important legacy of these organizations – of which, I might add, SER is only one part – reminds us of how sustained action can and does lead to powerful change in the face of adversity. The foundation they began 46 years ago translated frustration and likely, anger into organized action and power. From the ground-up, state by state, they spearheaded the establishment of the SER organization as a national network for Hispanics, minority women and the less fortunate. As evidenced here today, their efforts continue to catalyze positive action on behalf of Hispanics and other underserved communities in the United States. In addition to inspiring change, these organizations have also provided their time and energy to SER through involvement on the National Board of Directors, where they continue to provide guidance and programmatic resources. Thank you! Would you please stand and be recognized.

To all the affiliate SER organizations in operation today: You are the embodiment of the vision set forth by our founders--Your daily efforts are the SER legacy. Individually, each SER affiliate is a partner and resource for their community, able to literally transform the lives of local families by providing a path to economic stability through training and quality employment. Collectively, the network of our SER affiliates represents a powerful force across the country that has and will continue to make the American worker competitive in the global marketplace.

Clearly, National SER would not exist if not for the work of SER affiliates at the grassroots level and our success as a national organization should only be measured by our ability to augment your efforts at the local level. With this in mind, and on behalf of the Board of Directors for National SER, I thank all of our local affiliates for exemplifying and continually advancing the SER mission. Would you please stand and be recognized.

To our partners from corporate America: Your many contributions to our organization broaden our efforts at both the local and national levels. Through participation on the SER National Board of Directors, you help steer our organization towards continued success and growth. Through in-kind technical and product support you enhance our organization’s capacity to serve an ever-growing base of customers. You engage our staff in industry best practices, provide crucial business resources across the SER network, and open the door to cutting-edge technologies for our employees and customers. Thank you to all of our Corporate partners who made this conference possible. Please support them through your purchases.

Over the past several years, downturns in economic and business cycles, coupled with legislative changes and priorities, and other external factors, have posed challenges for National SER and the network. To address these challenges we have finalized our five year strategic plan and have made inroads in meeting the goals and objectives contained therein. Some of these involve establishing new and innovative programs that meet the needs of our constituency.

As you know, SER has operated multi-million dollar, multi-faceted programs such as SCSEP. And, Coaching to Care have successfully been operated at many of our affiliate locations.

We have testified and presented position papers at raising national awareness of the growing crisis of worker skills shortages in a new skills economy and the absolute need for workforce investment to be considered a matter of economic policy as much as it is one of social policy.

We have forged new partnerships with the business sector whose involvement is critical to our success. This past year Altria, CITI, GM Foundation and others invested in innovative practices to prepare the workforce of the future. Yet others like IBM, AT&T and Ford, have increased the amount provided annually.

SER assisted more than 1,000,000 individuals in 18 states, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia. This past year -- SER brought qualified workers into the job market prepared young people for the future and helped countless families move toward fulfilling careers and self sufficiency.

During the conference we recognized the efforts and special achievements of people that make this happen locally, like Nory Angel, Jose Cela, Alex Martinez , Becky Mendibles and Linda Rivas for their exemplary contributions and for giving their time, effort and influence to advance the SER cause and our collective mission.

It is fitting that in celebrating Hispanic Heritage month that we pause and reflect upon the tremendous impact they make on the lives of so many. During Hispanic Heritage month we celebrated more than just our heritage. Today, the entire U.S. Hispanic market is larger than the population and economy of Canada with a spending power more than one trillion dollars today. The Hispanic Latino population is also very young, vibrant and fast growing. Many of us today celebrate a new sense of belonging and a new sense of vitality sparked by the knowledge that many have made dramatic economic gains, educational advancements, strides in social mobility and an overall increase in the quality of life. Many have this today because of SER and tonight we celebrate this.

According the U.S. Census – Hispanics are the largest and fastest growing minority group. In 2010, the Hispanic population of the United States was over 50 million, or 16% of the nation’s total population. One in every six residents of the nation is Hispanic. And, many of the Hispanic population are now moving to States that are ill-equipped to provide workforce and education services to their new populations. Over the past decade, Latino population growth has been most rapid in the South where many states have seen their Latino populations double since 2000. States like Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee, etc. In the United States today there are 1.1 million Latino veterans of the armed forces. There are 2.3 million Hispanic owned businesses generating more than 350 billion dollars in revenue and the U.S. would be the second largest Hispanic country in the world, second only to Mexico based on population.

At the high school level, roughly 2,000 schools – about 12 percent of all high schools produce nearly half of our nation’s dropouts, and up to 75 percent of minority dropouts. This is unacceptable and must be reversed. Let’s remember that today 25% of high school students are Hispanic. More than 50% in states like Texas, California and New Mexico.

This is important because for the first time, more than half of the children under age 2 in the U.S. are Hispanic, part of a sweeping race change and a growing age divide between mostly white, older Americans and fast-growing younger ethnic populations that could reshape government policies.

Demographers say the numbers provide the clearest confirmation yet of a changing social order, one in which racial and ethnic minorities will become the U.S. majority by midcentury. Here in New Mexico we are home to a state that is virtually 50 percent Hispanic today. We live in changing times.

One might be led to believe that the federal deficit is the most pressing problem. It is not. One might be led to think that the most pressing challenge is global terrorism. It is not. The environment it is not. The biggest problem facing the nation is the skills gap and the lack of good jobs.

The U.S. Department of labor says that unemployment is around 9.1%. But when you consider underemployment, it is nearly 18% in minority communities those numbers are substantially higher.

In 1975, those with a bachelor’s degree earned around 60 percent more than those with a high school diploma. By 2008, the gap was 100 percent. Among American workers, the biggest losers then by far are those with a low level of education. This is because most of the new entrants to the global labor market in China and India also have a high school diploma or less. These emerging economy workers enter labor intensive export sectors such as apparel cutting and stitching, shoemaking, furniture making, electronic appliance assembly, and standardized manufacturing processes such as plastic injection.

When casualties of the jobs war give up hope of finding a job, just about everything else falls apart for them. They’re much likelier to report being in bad shape on almost all conditions of health and wellbeing. They have more physical pain, experience more sleeplessness, are more likely to be clinically depressed, have more anger, and need more healthcare in general. People who have been out of work for 18 months or longer lose engagement in their network of friends, community, and families. The worst things in life start showing up when people experience extended unemployment. But that’s not all. These wounded will probably never fully recover. They won’t meet their potential lifetime productivity and are likely to drift away from highly valuable community activities they might once have engaged in – coaching, mentoring and volunteering. Every job loss permanently changes the relationship every individual has with his or her city– and subsequently, the culture as well as the social fabric of a country.

Let’s remember “my job” defines “my identity” more than ever before. The wounds are different and deeper this time. Let’s also remember that the game-changing resource in the workplace lies within the almighty power of human nature first and the almighty dollar next. And that resource is the engaged worker.

The potential for discoveries, breakthroughs, trillions of dollars of authentic revenue, millions and billions of dollars for organizations, millions of authentic jobs and subsequent real growth in the United States – is in the worker’s state of mind.

There are more than 75 million students enrolled in schools in the United States – nearly 50 million in the 5th through 12th grades. They are the successors of today’s business leaders. The problem is, approximately 40% of those minority students will drop out or fail to graduate on schedule. This gives the rest of the developed world a huge advantage over the United States in the upcoming economic wars. If this problem isn’t fixed fast, the United States will lose the next worldwide, economic, job-based war because its players can’t read, write, or think as well as their competitors in a game for keeps – if their talent doesn’t get maximized.

What reverses this? What causes the dropout problem and what are the strategies to prevent it? This actually isn’t hard: Studies have found that kids drop out of school when they lose hope to graduate. That’s it. Not because they’re lured into gangs or have to flip burgers to support their family. The reason they lose hope of graduating is because they don’t feel excited about what’s next in their lives. The moment they feel that despair about what is ahead, they start psychologically dropping out. Having no vision or excitement for the future is the cause of dropping out of school. Students need to be rescued at or before the moment they lose hope in the future. And when they aren’t caught in time, they don’t just drop out of school, they drop out of life. This can be fixed if America aims its strategies at the cause verses the effects of hopelessness. This is what SER does.

We don’t want America to lose this war. The country is the beacon for the world’s most talented people, the men and women who create the best jobs and continue to advance human development for the benefit of everyone. The United States of America is an exceptional country with exceptional people. Once again, she must rise up and win. SER will help make this happen.

America had one of the most educated workforces in the world. But today, we rank ninth in the world in college completion. For Hispanics the rate is 15 percent. We must do better. One of the most difficult challenges in America today is being mindful of others. The social safety net is frayed. The poor are suffering while the politicians discuss cutting the social safety net even further.

The poverty trap is the result of a system of handouts, in which the poor are not helped enough to overcome poverty but just barely enough to survive in poverty. Thus, a society that disdains handouts ends up living by them, rather than promoting true solutions with lasting value. The Pew Hispanic Center has just released a study showing the largest group of children in the U.S. living in poverty are now Latino.

We need to chart a path from here that restores hope, direction, and decency to American society to remain strong. We need an honest approach to poverty, not one that blames the poor and leaves them to their fate. We know that the single most important key to ending the cycle of poverty is to enable today’s children growing up in poverty to reach their full human potential. That in turn requires that America as a society invest in the human capital – meaning the health nutrition, cognitive skill, and education – of every child born in the nation, whether born to wealth or poverty. We have to change the poverty rates of children, especially minority children. SER understands this and works to make this happen.

The Center for Responsible Lending, a nonprofit research and advocacy group, estimated that property depreciation related to foreclosures between 2009 and 2012 would end up costing the Latino community 177 billion dollars. The center also concluded that nearly 9 percent of both African American and Latinos have lost their homes to foreclosures, compared to 4.5 percent of whites.

American history of economic discrimination left most Hispanics and blacks unable to accumulate the intergenerational wealth- trust funds-mortgage free property and unencumbered cash- that would have permitted them to weather the storm. And residential segregation made zip codes largely inhabited by Latinos and blacks easy to target for subprime loans. Blatant racism may be forbidden today, but brutal unfairness remains a fact of life. Because of this we have intensified our financial literacy programs to put financial knowledge in the minds of those that need it the most.

America’s job challenge begins with the skills deficit. The crisis is the worst for youth, especially minority youth, aged sixteen to nineteen in the labor force. The key long-term jobs strategy must therefore be educational attainment and skill information. In general, this should entail the goal of universal high school completion, at 90 percent and high continuation rate to college or vocational school, and a 50 percent or higher continuation rate to a bachelor’s degree. This is especially important for Hispanics and other minorities.

We can agree with a recent congressional advisory panel that “America’s global competitiveness depends on the ability of our high school graduates to earn at least a bachelor’s degree.” For students who have already dropped out, the goal should be a targeted effort to bring such youth up to at least a high school equivalency diploma and then on to a community college or vocational school.

A tight labor market will not suffice: those kids lack the skills they will need to function for the next forty years in the labor market, not just the next business cycle. This is why SER works in local communities. Many poor kids drop out of high school. Others finish high school but can’t surmount the financial barriers to begin college. Many others start college but can’t finish, dropping out because of raising debts and the need to work.

All along the path from preschool to the bachelor’s degree, a stark income gradient prevails: poor kids are left behind in a society in which individual households and local communities, rather than the society as a whole, bear the brunt of educational costs. This is why SER helps those in need at the local level.

The path to national prosperity, life satisfaction, and sustainability in the twenty-first century will depend heavily on education, and especially on a large proportion of today’s young Americans that are predominantly Hispanic and minority being able to complete higher education, albeit a higher education that has been fashioned to fit the needs of our times.

One of the bright spots in education is the potential, for information technology to transform the educational process, making it more effective, affordable and accessible to all. More and more curricula can be found online; more and more distance learning can link disparate communities together. For this reason SER has launched its online high school and is working on the development of its online university.

Much has begun but much remains to be done.

Let me start to close with a quote from President John F. Kennedy: “When a man’s ways please the Lord,” the Scriptures tell us, “he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.” And is not peace, in the last analysis, basically a matter of human rights – the right to live out our lives without fear or devastation –– the right of future generations to a healthy existence?

As a society let’s resolve to live up to the spirit of high accomplishment, fair play, and equality of opportunity that has defined America in its best days. If we again invest in ourselves – for good health, a safe environment, knowledge and cutting edge skills – renewed America prosperity can still be secured.

We are, in the end, stewards of the future. We have great tasks ahead, to redeem once again the American trust in democracy and equality. We have a high responsibility to our children and other generations that will come. Let us begin anew with the ideal that out best days are ahead of us. That we can build a stronger nation with increased opportunities for all Americans. And with the resolve that we will not settle for anything less.

Anyone who has worked for ser knows the true value in life is giving. They have witnessed miracles. people who were headed for prison, or a life on drugs, on the streets, full of pain, ready to give up because no one cared enough to love them and help them. SER does beautiful work, god’s work. It changes lives and touches so many. What ser does in changing the attitudes, body language, and the look in the eyes of people is the most beautiful gift available to anyone alive. The gift of hope! The gift of love! The belief that they can be someone of value and that they too can and will contribute in meaningful ways. Thank you for being part of SER.

Gracias un fuerte abrazo a todos.

Ignacio Salazar is the President and CEO of SER Jobs for Progress National, and the past Chairman of the Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR).