The following editorial appeared Feb. 28 in the Tri-City Herald.

We need a well-educated work force and we’ll have to rely on all the people who live here.

As the Hispanic population grows in the Northwest, high school graduation rates for Hispanic students also need to rise. So do the number of college degrees.

But they’re not. Test scores and college attendance for Hispanic students aren’t keeping pace with the population growth.

That’s not just a problem for the Hispanic community. The growing lack of highly qualified workers is hurting every part of the region’s economy. It will only worsen if trends aren’t reversed.

Gabriel Portugal of Pasco, vice chairman of the state Commission on Hispanic Affairs, summed it up when he said, “Things have been the same for the Hispanics for a long time.”

Undoubtedly that’s true, but the problem isn’t going unnoticed.

Already, lots of folks are aware of it – and working on it.

It’s at the top of the list for our school districts, Columbia Basin College and Washington State University.

Each of these organizations is aware of the need to reach out to the Hispanic community.

Their efforts to narrow the achievement gap between Hispanic students and their classmates are meeting with some success.

CBC, for example, recently doubled its Hispanic graduation rate and increased its Hispanic population from 9 percent in 2001 to 29 percent today.

Such examples are heartening, but much remains to be done.

A proposal in the state Legislature would create a task force to look more closely at the problem and make suggestions to the 2009 Legislature.

Bringing up the test scores for Hispanic students and increasing the number of college-bound graduates means changing our approach and bridging some cultural differences.

A statewide task force can focus more attention on the issue, especially identifying what works and what doesn’t.

A study isn’t action, of course, but it’s a step in the right direction.