Beyond Enrollment and Graduation: Examining Strategic Plans from Hispanic-Serving Institutions in Texas

As more Latinx students enroll at Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), it is important for institutions of higher education to intentionally engage in strategic planning that aligns their mission, values, and goals with their changing environments. In this content analysis, we examined how the strategic plans of 19 public 2-year and 4-year HSIs in Texas described the ways in which they served Latinx students beyond enrollment and graduation rates. We propose three HSI orientations -Latinx-ghosting, Latinx-leaning, andLatinx-serving -to demonstrate how HSIs target efforts and resources to serve Latinx students. Our findings suggest there are misalignments between the goals outlined in some strategic plans and the actual measures and practices provided to achieve these goals. Ultimately, we argue that strategic plans from institutions codified as Latinx-serving have the potential to serve as peer examples and roadmaps for current HSIs and emerging-HSIs.