Capstone Checkpoint
Some specific information I learned about race and ethnicity is the population of certain ethnic groups and the areas they tend to inhabit. When I started this course I would have said that southern Florida is populated by a lot of Hispanics. Now I can tell you that 68% of all the Cubans living in America reside in Florida ("Cubans In The United States ", 2006). I also learned that the total population of Hispanic Americans was 44.3 million in 2006 ("U.s. Census Bureau", 2006).
I also learned something about my own heritage. It seemed like every time my father spoke of a relative that I had never met, they lived in northern Minnesota. I never actually gave it much thought until I wrote a paper for this class. According to the "Norwegian Americans" (n.d.) website, there are 851,000 Norwegians living in Minnesota.
The population of the United States will look drastically different by the year 2050. The Hispanic American population will see the largest growth due to immigration. Nearly 82% of the increase in population between 2005 and 2050 will be due to immigration and the children they have (U.S. Population Projections: 2005 – 2050”, n.d.). The non-Hispanic white population will not increase at the same rate as other ethnic groups. Projections show them becoming the minority in America in 2050 with 47% of the population (U.S. Population Projections: 2005 – 2050”, n.d.).
I think the best way to prepare for the changes in the future is to better educate our children.