| Palo Alto College (PAC) in San Antonio, Texas, will use HSIAC funds to create a community center called PAC El Pueblo where the college can offer computer training sessions and adult literacy classes that have a health-specific content. The community center, located on the PAC campus, will target its services exclusively to community members who are not enrolled as credit students at the college.
Two initiatives will be based out of PAC El Pueblo: the Health Education and Literacy Program (HELP) and the Technologies for Information and Knowledge Integration (TIKI) program. HELP will address health literacy issues and will build on a successful Community Health and Affordable Housing Fair that attracted 1,200 community residents to campus in 1999. TIKI will focus on providing technological literacy to community residents.
San Antonio is a city of extreme contrasts. On the one hand, it is the 10th largest and second fastest growing city in the nation. On the other hand, it has the country's second highest urban poverty rate (22 percent), and its average annual wages rank as the lowest among the nation's 50 largest metropolitan areas. According to the 1990 Census, the area of Southern San Antonio that is adjacent to PAC has a 42-percent poverty rate and is home to more than 52 percent of the city's residents living in poverty. Eighty percent of the neighborhood's population is Hispanic.
One of the most significant problems faced by Hispanics in South San Antonio is lack of access to healthcare and information about health issues. The Texas Department of Public Health noted in 1999 that many of the state's Hispanic residents have economic, social, or other issues that place them at increased risk for developing illness and experiencing premature death. Nearly 37 percent of the state's Hispanics lack health insurance, compared with 16 percent of Whites and 28 percent of African Americans. Hispanics also comprised 47.5 percent of all reported tuberculosis cases in the state.
|
