'Model minority' myth hides reality

Pacific Islanders fared poorly. Only 15% of Native Hawaiians, for example, had college degrees.

Chang said the lower income groups do not have the stellar high school preparation or other advantages of the more affluent ones.

The majority of Asian American students at UCLA are from low-income families, Chang said. Their choice of colleges is between UCLA and the Cal State system, not pricey private schools, he said.

They often feel "tremendous pressure" to fit the model minority stereotype, continuing to struggle, for example, in science or math programs when they would be better suited to other areas of study.

"They end up having to drop out, or don't do well enough to get into medical school," Chang said.

"For the general public, there's an idea these Asians are pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, but they're often struggling in ways very similar to other groups," he said. "We shouldn't assume they're all going to do well for some magical or mystical reasons."

Chang and Don Nakanishi, director of UCLA's Asian American Studies Center, conducted a study last year that paralleled some of the findings of the new report. Nakanishi said he hoped that the new study, by directly attacking common myths, would dispel the misrepresentation of the Asian American experience in higher education.

"Among many of us who have worked on issues of Asian Americans in education . . . is a fear there will be a backlash to this growth in what would appear to be a large number of Asian American kids, particularly at public institutions like the University of California," Nakanishi said. "We haven't quite seen it, but it is something we worry about."

The report, he said, demonstrates the diversity of issues Asian American students face.

"All the kids aren't from suburban high schools," he said. "They do have some special needs that come from the kinds of backgrounds they come from."

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gale.holland@latimes.com