Doing Good in the Hood? The Effects of Neighborhood Concentration on the Educational Attainment of Mexican, Filipino, and Vietnamese Immigrant Youth

Rennie Lee, University of California, Los Angeles

A paradox in the immigration literature is that some immigrant youth outperform others even when they belong to underprivileged immigrant communities and attend disadvantageous schools. The neighborhood may be an indicator in explaining the educational gap among immigrant children. No study has quantitatively assessed the impact of coethnic neighborhood concentration on the educational attainment of immigrant youth. Using the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Data in California, I examine the effect of living in a concentrated coethnic neighborhood on the educational attainment of second generation Mexican, Filipino, and Vietnamese youth. The results indicate that coethnic residence has a positive effect on educational attainment for Vietnamese immigrants but not among Mexican and Filipino immigrant youth.