wow, you get to watch all your favorite stuff. it's to die for. now you won't miss a thing. this is the way. xfinity internet. made for streaming. ♪ amna, good evening. i'm amna nawaz. geoff, and i'm geoff bennett. on the "newshour" tonight, civilians in both gaza and lebanon are once again caught in the crossfire, while the u.s. promises to send an air defense system to israel. amna: vice president kamala harris works to shore up support from black voters while former president donald trump ramps up his dangerous political rhetoric. geoff: and, how some prominent colleges are reaching out to students from rural areas that

are often overlooked. >> these students are also not getting the same information that a lot of their peers are getting in more urban and suburban areas, because colleges don't come visit them. ♪ announcer: major funding for the pbs news hour has been provided by -- ♪ the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. and friends of the news hour including leonard and norma klorfine and the judy and peter blum kovler foundation. >> two retiring executives turned their focus to greyhounds giving these former race dogs a real chance to win. a raymond james financial advisor gets to know you, your purpose and the way you give back.

life well planned. >> the william and flora hewlett foundation. for more than 50 years, advancing ideas and supporting institutions to promote a better world. at hewlett.org. and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. ♪ announcer: this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ geoff: welcome to the newshour. a weekend of death and destruction gave way to another

day of carnage today in gaza and lebanon, as israeli forces struck multiple sites in both places, killing dozens. israel suffered its own losses, as its troops in the north came under fire from hezbollah. amna: that drone attack killed four israeli soldiers. but much focus fell again on gaza, and an israeli attack outside a major hospital in gaza's north. that's where leila molana-allen begins our coverage tonight. and a warning, images and accounts in this story are disturbing. leila: burned alive in a hospital bed. an iv that was supposed to heal became shackles. last night in deir el balah, central gaza, screams echoed through the night as an israeli air strike hit a makeshift tent village outside al-aqsa hospital, setting the tents and part of the building ablaze. >> there were people trapped inside the fire, and we were unable to pull them out. a human being burning alive in

front of your eyes, and you can't rescue him. he turned to ashes. leila: at least four people were killed, and dozens injured. today, as the smoke cleared, doctors attempted to tend their burns without painkillers or ointments. survivors sifted through the rubble of their temporary homes. >> everything has burned, everything. as you can see, i am a mother of seven daughters. where shall i go? my tent has collapsed, destroyed. all our clothes and belongings are gone. who should we speak to? where is the safety? we are calling on all countries, the whole world to stand by our side and stop the war. we are exhausted. we've had enough. leila: nearby in nuseirat, a night of horror for displaced families, as the idf struck an unrwa school where families were seeking shelter. the attack killed at least 22 people, including 15 children. >> they were sleeping, unarmed. they're innocent. this is little raghad's blanket here.

she was only 2 years old. this morning they removed their bodies, but the fire was still everywhere. then there was another wave of airstrikes. the injured and dead were everywhere. we've had enough of this. have mercy on us. they took their childhoods away, they took our smiles away. they've taken away every beautiful detail in our our lis. leila: fatima's son says all he wants is freedom from this war. he doesn't fear death anymore. he's seen too much. >> the fire was burning for 3 hours while we were carrying the dead, and collecting their cut-off fingers, which we put in a box and took them to the hospital. the children here are dying. everyone is going to die. we're not going to keep going from place to place. at least we'll die in our country. leila: in israel last, night an idf base south of haifa was hit by a hezbollah drone. the strike killed four soldiers, and wounded dozens of others. even as the united states sends a new missile defence system to

israel, israelis worry their air defence cannot handle the increasing threat from drones. >> we are required to provide better protection, we will investigate this incident, learn and improve. our mission is to better protect our soldiers and citizens of israel. leila: as idf troops push further across the border into south lebanon, israeli soldiers posted videos of themselves inside lebanese homes. after multiple attacks on unifil bases by israeli troops left several u.n. peacekeepers wounded, israeli prime minister benjamin neyanyahu reiterated his demand that peacekeepers withdraw. >> the idf has repeatedly asked for this. it is time to remove the soldiers from the fighting areas. the idf has repeatedly asked for this, and has been met with repeated refusals, all aimed at providing a human shield to hezbollah terrorists. your refusal to evacuate the unifil soldiers makes them hostages of hezbollah.

leila: the u.n. maintains they must stay under international law, and that it is incumbent on israeli and lebanese forces to ensure their safety. the idf demanded the evacuation of a further 20 towns and villages. fully a third of the country is now under fire. yesterday, a century old souk and mosque in nabatieh were razed to the ground. 2300 people are now dead, nearly 11,000 injured. the idf says it will tell lebanese when they can return, but many of their homes, entire villages too, have been flattened. and the bombing is escalating across the country. in the past few days, christian towns in the north were hit for the first time, while the strike zone in the capital continues to expand, often without warning. mohammad was left reeling after the streets housing his family home and his gym business in a calm, central beirut neighbourhood were hit within 5 minutes of each other.

the area had become home to dozens of displaced families who fled from the south. his family survived, but many in their building didn't. >> we're all families here, no weapons or hezbollah leaders or anything. i don't know what they're thinking, that they could kill us like this. when you see people dead, and body parts all over the place, you don't know how to feel. especially after the terror we experienced after the strike. leila: some have decided they can't take it any more. nearly 100,000 lebanese have fled to syria, taking their chances with a stagnant civil war there over an escalating one here. after one air strike too many, wihad and her teenage daughter left home with what they could carry. >> my heart is in lebanon. we will definitely return, it's my country frankly. but fear. one cannot trust israel. it targets all the places.

leila: as conflict spreads, this region is no longer boiling. it is burning. for the pbs newshour, i'm leila molana-allen in beirut. amna: and watching the latest developments for us here is our foreign and defense correspondent, nick schifrin. let's begin with the u.s. deployment of an air defense system to israel. tell us about that. how significant is it? nick: this is the first time u.s. forces will deploy into israel. there will be a terminal highl altitude area defense battery the defense against ballistic missiles that would be used alongside israeli missile defense against iranian attacks. this is two weeks after iran's 180 ballistic missiles caused no damage, but as you can see, got u.s. and israeli air defense. that would help defend israel should iran launch another attack in response to an

israeli strike on iran. u.s. officials tell me that they continue to urge israel not to attack nuclear sites but to target military intelligence sites. u.s. officials tell me that they believe israel's leadership is listening but there is no guarantee about their final decision. as for the thaad battery, the president said it will be to protect israel but the u.s. only has seven of them all over the world and they are very expensive. there is no quick way to replenish missiles if u.s.'s use them to help protect israel. amna: let me ask you about gaza, we have seen israel intensify it's assault in northern gaza and the u.s. -- the u.n. has condemned the large number of civilian casualties. what is behind that intensification? nick: as for the strike, a national security council spokesperson said this afternoon that what happened there is "horrifying." the idf statement said they targeted terrorists operating

inside a command-and-control center in a parking lot filled with displaced persons next to the hospital, and the fire was most likely caused by secondary explosions and they are reviewing the incident. we have talked for the last year, the israeli rules of engagement allow israel to target hamas leaders or hamas fighters even if surrounded by civilians, even if surrounded by women and children. and israel calls that hamas using civilians as human shields. but i u.n. report calls out israel for its concerted policy to destroy gaza's health care system and the airstrike is part of a larger israeli effort in northern gaza. the israeli military has reentered northern gaza with tanks and issued evacuation orders for 400,000 people as hamas fighters have regrouped. u.s. officials say hamas fighters have only regrouped because israel has no strategy for the day after.

the u.n. also said israel's new campaign has blocked all in northern gaza since october 1, leaving israel's military to deny a plan that has been made public that is known as the retired general's plan, to starve out northern gaza and create a permanent military zone. today israel published these images, some 40 trucks arriving in northern gaza. u.s. officials have been pushing israel to allow more aid to go in and warning that if it didn't go in, the u.s. could declare that israel was officially blocking aid, and that could as the u.s. suspending arms sales to israel. amna: and on lebanon, what is the israeli goal there? nick: israeli officials say they are trying to get 60,000 people displaced from northern israel back into their homes. to do so, they have to go into southern lebanon to get rid of hezbollah fighters and tunnels. we saw this released today,

israeli forces releasing a hezbollah command and control bunker with weapons, food, motorcycles for an attack. the bottom line is, the route israel would need to go in with armored vehicles run right through u.n. bases. today u.s. says unifil must not be harmed. the last time israel promised a limited invasion was lebanon in 1982 and they stayed for 18 years. amna: thank you very much. ♪ geoff: turning our focus now to the 2024 presidential race. over the weekend, vice president kamala harris made stops in north carolina, while out west, former president donald trump ratcheted up his political rhetoric. but tonight, both candidates are in opposite corners of one of the most important states in this election, pennsylvania.

laura barron lopez has our report. laura: this afternoon, kamala harris jetted off to the country's largest battleground state. the vice president is doing in pennsylvania as she did in north carolina over the weekend, energizing black voters. meanwhile, former president donald trump increased his extreme rhetoric, describing some american citizens as enemies. >> i think the bigger problem is the enemy from within. laura: in a fox news interview yesterday, maria bartiromo asked trump whether or not election day would be peaceful. >> we have some very bad people, we have some sick people, radical left lunatics, and i think they're the big problem, and it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by the national guard or if really necessary by the military, because they can't let that happen. >> this kind of terminology is the terminology of dictators. laura: ruth ben-ghiat is an american historian and scholar. >> initially, he's been doing

anti-immigrant rhetoric since 2015. it was keeping people out. so that you should militarize the border. but now, it is the enemies within. that enemy can be anywhere, even in the heartland, such as aurora or springfield. and thus he's talking about using various types of armed forces, national guard, and he says even the military to go and liberate these territories. and this is very dangerous rhetoric. it's turning armed force against a domestic population. and that's what dictators have done in the past. laura: trump's choice language didn't stop at fox news. on saturday, he described american towns as being invaded at a rally in coachella, california. >> we're like an occupied country. we got people taking over parts of colorado. we have people taking over other states. november 5th, 2024 will be liberation day in america, liberation day.

>> this is a strategy. the ultimate goal is to convince americans that democracy is failing, and that strongman leadership to fix everything, but donald trump will say, "i alone can fix it." and that is supposed to be the answer. and so as soon as he would take over and go back to the white house, all of our problems would be solved. but this is based on a fictional reality that's been created by disinformation. laura: in prescott valley, arizona this weekend, trump made a new immigration pledge, to add 10,000 agents to border patrol ranks, and bump up their salaries. >> i will be asking congress immediately to approve a 10% raise. they haven't had one in a long time, for all agents. and a $10,000 each retention and signing bonus. so we're going to retain them. we're going to retain them. laura: across the country, at

her own rally in greenville, north carolina, harris, who released her own medical records on saturday, took a swing at the former president's lack of transparency. >> he refuses to release his medical records. i've done it. every other presidential candidate in modern era has done it. he is unwilling to do a 60 minutes interview, like every other major party candidate has done for more than half a century. he is unwilling to meet for a second debate. laura: back in pennsylvania, where the stakes couldn't be higher, this festival in greeley, described by vendors as "three days of god, guns and motorcycles," drew huge crowds of trump voters. with november 5th just 3 weeks away, die-hard trump supporters

are counting down the days. >> we're 23 days away from the election. the days drag. it's like a ten year old waiting for santa claus to come. the days just can't get here fast enough. laura: for the pbs newshour, i'm laura barron lopez. ♪ stephanie: i'm stephanie sy with news hour west. here are the latest headlines. fema announced tonight it will resume normal operations in north carolina. over the weekend, the agency aiding hurricane victims changed some operations in response to reported threats made to its workers. a 44-year-old armed man was arrested and charged with a single misdeamanor offense. he was later released on bond, and local authorities tell the newshour he was acting alone, and not as part of a militia as was originally reported. fema has faced rampant disinformation about its response to hurricanes helene and milton.

officials in taiwan say that china launched large-scale military exercises today to warn against taiwanese independence. taiwan's defense ministry says beijing used several warships and 125 military aircraft, a -- to surround the island. officials in taipei say they believe beijing was simulating a blockade of taiwanese ports and international shipping lanes. >> this irrational and provocative military exercise threatens security in the taiwan strait. it undermines the security of the indo-pacific region and threatens the rules-based international order. stephanie: beijing says the drills were intended to punish taiwan's president for saying in a speech last week that china "has no right to represent taiwan." a nasa spacecraft lifted off today, on a mission to explore jupiter's moon europa for signs of the building blocks of life. >> 3, 2, 1.

ignition. and, lift off. stephanie: the un-manned europa clipper launched from florida's kennedy space center aboard a spacex rocket to begin its 5-and-a-half year journey. it will cover 1.8 million miles before entering orbit around jupiter. europa clipper will then do dozens of flybys of the moon, looking at what's believed to be a vast ocean beneath its icy surface. scientists say that if conditions are found to be favoble, then it's possible life could exist on other ocean worlds, much like earth. california governor gavin newsom signed legislation today aimed at reining in gas prices. the new law gives the state the authority to require refiners to store more gas, which proponents argue will buffer against supply shortages and lower prices. but opponents, including the governors of arizona and nevada, have said the move could lead to higher gas prices. and, we have a passing of note. equal pay icon lilly ledbetter

has died. her decision to speak up about not being paid the same as her male colleagues eventually paved the way for the fair pay act in her name. when she sued her old employer, goodyear tires, in 1999 for gender discrimination, the supreme court ultimately told her in a 2007 ruling that she'd fallen outside of the statute of limitations. the lilly ledbetter fair pay act changed that, making it easier for workers to sue for pay discrimination. in 2009, it was the first bill then-president barack obama signed into law. at the 2012 democratic national convention, ledbetter made clear the fight for equal pay was far from over. >> women who faced pay discrimination like i did will now get their day in court. that was the first step, but it can't be the last. because women still earn just 77 cents for every dollar men make.

those pennies add up to real money. stephanie: more than a decade later, the census bureau says that women still only make about 83 cents on the dollar compared to men. mr. obama posted on social media today that, "lilly ledbetter never set out to be a trailblazer, or a household name. she just wanted to be paid the same as a man for her hard work." lilly ledbetter was 86 years old. still to come on the "newshour," we speak to the winner of the nobel prize in economics about his work on global inequality. a new initiative aims to connect more rural students to colleges. and how a growing number of latinos who don't speak spanish are reclaiming their idenities. ♪ >> this is the pbs news hour

from the david m rubin signed studio from weta in washington and in the west, from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. amna: with just three weeks to go until election day, the presidential race is still in a dead heat, with both campaigns looking to cut into their opponent's margins. for more on their strategies and policies, i'm joined now by our politics monday duo. that is amy walter of the cook political report with amy walter and tamara keith of npr. great to see you both. let's take a quick look and set the stage. two new national polls to talk about, the first from nbc news, you see harris at 48% and trump with 48%. the second is from abc news and 's has 49%, trump with 47%. that is within the margin of error. a close race getting closer. >> it does feel that way. if you think about where we were say in september, and of -- at the end of september, it had been a pretty momentous few

weeks for kamala harris. she gets the nomination. the base rallies around her quickly and we go to the dnc. she has a successful debate. but that momentum has since, i don't know whether the word is plateaued or hit a wall and there is a sign in national polls that there has been some backsliding and that trump is doing better at independent voters. he has halves, as well as cbs, all networks came out with three their national surveys. there is the sense that on the issues there is also the fact that on the issues that voters are most concerned about like the economy, donald trump still has the lead. to me, the most important thing i found in the nbc poll to me is that voters look at donald trump's presidency retroactively a lot rosier than they did a year ago. and probably more rosy than they did when he was sitting as president. harris' focus is on trying to make the case that he should not be brought back into the white

house, but right now you saw most voters, or a plurality of voters in the nbc poll saying they thought trump's policies helped them. they didn't think bidens policies had helped them. amna: we have been seeing the harris campaign rolling out surrogates including president obama, president clinton, trying to reach male voters, lachman -- black men specifically. we saw some new economic proposals from the harris campaign today. >> that demographic is important. in a race that will be decided on the margins, we always say this but she cannot afford to lose these voters. i was in north carolina last week reporting in a part of the state where black voter turnout really was down in 2022. and it has been falling in recent years. talking to voters, i went to barbershops and i spoke with i talked to when joe biden was

on the ballot and i went back and spoke to them again. though euphoria at her rallies was not present in those barbershops. and a couple people i talked to said specifically that while they were supporting harris, they weren't sure that all of their male friends and family would simply because they don't believe their friends and family are ready for a woman leader, for a female president. and they are talking to their friends about it and going back and forth but this is a real concern that was voiced by former president obama at a campaign event in pittsburgh. he said, the enthusiasm particularly among black men isn't what it was when it was for him. he called it out, and said that maybe there are some people who aren't feeling it. does that persuade? does that move people to the polls? i don't know. but they are being quite open about their challenges and she will be appearing with

charlamagne tha god doing a town hall style event. again, trying to reach that key demographic. amna: so much more to unpack that we won't have time for but amy, the harris campaign also announced she will do an interview with fox in pennsylvania on wednesday. is it risky for the democratic nominee to go on the pro-trump network? with three weeks left? >> when we talk about fighting on the margins, the other margin is where she does with white voters especially white voters with a college degree. for as much as her coalition is not looking like the biden coalition with voters of color, where she is doing better than biden did and if it holds than any other democrat has ever done is with white college-educated voters. now, that, again, you were not going to win over a lot of fox voters but pulling out some of the margins,

i think what she is also trying to do is goad donald trump. go out in public a lot more. she needs donald trump to be in the spotlight. more specifically, some of the things he says and does that, like what laura's piece was about, we have to be careful about the enemy within, making that a centerpiece of her campaign and one way to do that is to go on sources of news that are not necessarily friendly. amna: to that point, in terms of what we heard from former president trump there has been an escalation of some of the more dangerous kinds of rhetoric saying that he would go after the enemy from within with the u.s. military. he said that the same day jd vance refused to say in an interview that trump lost the 2020 election. these are antidemocratic messages. >> these are antidemocratic messages. however, he is not trying to win over new voters.

he is not trying to expand into suburban women that didn't support him last time and probably won't this time. he isn't trying to win over a -- we know for people who will find that language alarming. he is trying to excite people want that -- who want that, who are here for it under excited about the idea of returning the country do something that it was in a different time. that is why you have him running these ads on repeat with different narrators targeting different demographics talking about trans athletes and harris supporting trans people. sayi she is for they them and not us. this is messaging targeted at young white male voters and others who are uncomfortable with changes happening in

society, and who are looking to him to take them back and make america great again, if you will. and so that language, yes, it will turn off the people that are already not going to vote for him but it could excite the people he needs to get off the couch. in the competition with the couch, he is escalating the rhetoric to make the stakes higher. amna: we will hear from harris this week, as well, who will lean into exactly that which is, we can't allow this kind of rhetoric. we can't allow this person back into the white house. ramping up the same distress signals to her voters who might be sitting on the couch. that is where both of them are right now. the greater fear is not that they will lose swing voters to the other side but to just and them to sitting at home. amna: competition with the couch. amy walter, tamera, great to see you both. thank you. >> you are welcome.

>> you are welcome. ♪ geoff: the nobel prize in economics was awarded today to a trio of economists who have published work that looks at what accounts for inequality between countries and how the role of institutions, government and colonialism affected prosperity generations later. the nobel was awarded to james robinson of the university of chicago, daroon acemoglu of mit, and his colleague, and a frequent guest on this program, simon johnson, also of mit. simon johnson joins us now to talk about the award and some of these findings. congratulations. >> thank you. geoff: recount the moment that you learned you were a nobel prize winner. >> i woke up at 6:00 which is my usual getting up time, and i looked at my phone, routine and saw some text messages. i did not believe it so i did some checking on the internet

before i was finally convinced that i had indeed won the prize with my colleagues. geoff: your work examines the different types of colonialism and colonization and how it ended up with some nations being poor and some being rich. what did you find? what accounts for the prosperity gaps between nations? >> a big part of the prosperity gap particularly with countries that were formerly colonized by the europeans was the way the europeans took over those countries. indigenous treated very badly but in some places european colonial authorities decided to bring in more europeans and then they wanted to make that attractive so they would give more rights to the people they were trying to bring in. in other places, they just tried to control the local population. run the site -- the slave trade and extract taxes. and those places set up institutions and a lot of those initial ones, including those that were bad for most people, have persisted or the effects have lasted in ways that we still live with today. geoff: what drew you to this type of research?

>> i personally came to this after 10 years of working in the former eastern bloc after the collapse of the soviet union. i worked in poland and other countries, ukraine and russia and i was frustrated with the fact that some of our standard economic tools were not working as expected. i started to think about it and to study corruption, the unofficial economy and other things at the structure economy. and i met my colleagues who were already studying political economy and we came up with an idea of digging deeply into what causes institutions, social, political and economic arrangements to be so different across countries. geoff: how do you see the role of institutions and economies across the world right now, given the rise of populism and authoritarianism across the globe? >> i think there is a big challenge for institutions and a big challenge for democracy. part of the challenge is that over the last four decades we have not delivered on the kind of shared prosperity that was previously promised in the

postwar period. people are disappointed. the middle class has been squeezed. this is a definite problem in the united states and other industrial countries. there has been a delegitimization of the institutions and a challenge in the way that politics has been organized. and this is real. artificial intelligence is now arriving, a major new challenge to economic opportunities for the middle class. it is an opportunity to do things better but it is not an opportunity we have grasped yet. it is a serious challenge right now. geoff: what does that look like, harnessing technology and making it accessible to the greatest amount of people for the greatest good? >> think about your iphone. or any mobile technology. is it helping people with a lot of education? people that can be quite sophisticated in the use of computers? or is it empowering people who don't have a lot of education to acquire that education and those skills to

manage their lives better and be more productive in all kinds of jobs? blue-collar and white-collar jobs? that is a critical element. if you can boost people's productivity and deliver high wages, then you have the basis of a genuine shared prosperity. but if any technology that arrives including our digital technologies undermine the middle class, if the focus of corporate america is replacing people with machines and algorithms, then we have a problem because you are pushing even more people down out of the middle class. geoff: winning this award is such incredible validation of your work. how might it influence you going forward? >> my colleagues and i have a research center called shaking the future of work. we already have the agenda we believe will carry us for some decades which is how to get more good jobs in the united states and around the world. it is simple to state the problem, but very hard to deliver.

it requires an all of society approach and not just academics. there is a lot of work for corporate people. i work in a business school. many positive, productive and hard conversations we have there. it is also an issue for policymakers. i think it is something that we can do better. some episodes in the past we have managed things including -- so technology delivered benefits for broad cross sections of society but that is not what we have done over the past four decades. we need a course correction. geoff: nobel prize-winning economist, simon johnson. thank you for joining us and again, congratulations. >> thank you very much. ♪ amna: students in rural communities graduate from high school at a rate above the national average. but when it comes to applying to college or getting their degrees, the same students' attendance and completion rates are well below their peers. stephanie sy reports from new

mexico on an initiative to help narrow the gap. it is part of our series, rethinking college. reporter: questa is a remote majority hispanic village in northern new mexico puffs mountains. its high school has just 18 seniors and yet on a recent fall morning, a bus full of representatives from selective universities had arrived for a recruiting visit. >> your identity and community and your upbringing and experience is a strength and an asset, not a disadvantage. stephanie: this college access advocate explained to 11th and 12th graders why the colleges had come. x many of them have identified, they weren't built for you. students from small communities in northern new mexico. they are realizing that they're missing that voice on their campus. stephanie: last year at less than half of the graduates enrolled in college and those that did went to and say -- in state

schools according to this counselor. >> these kids have not had the exposure that there is opportunity out there. reporter: in rural new mexico, 20% of young adults complete college compared to 32 percent in urban areas. >> a lot of them don't know what colleges are out there. stephanie: and what colleges exist. there is a lot of reasons for that statistic. >> they don't know how to pay for college. they don't know the process of applying. stephanie: and they may never have thought of going out of state. marjorie is an admissions officer at the university of chicago. she herself grew up in a small town in georgia and can relate. >> these students are not given the same a nation that their peers are getting in urban and suburban areas because colleges don't come visit them. they don't get opportunities to ask questions or learn about different scholarships. stephanie: traveling for hours to schools where there may be only a few dozen students to meet with takes real commitment and

nonprofit funding. >> we want to give you a chance to think about college research. stephanie: the admission officers held workshops prompting students to consider various aspects of college such as campus social life. >> take a look. think about what comes to mind. stephanie: there were sessions on paying for college. where students tried running the numbers. >> you are going to look at a financial aid package. that is at the bottom. stephanie: and a college fair where kids could collect information about visiting schools and speak with college representatives one-on-one. >> my mom is excited for me to go to college because she did not. i would be the first generation to go to college. stephanie: this junior was curious about the out-of-state visitors, but although she is a top student -- >> whenever i think about college i think about tuition, so i think about in-state college. >> what did you think about the colleges today? stephanie: this counselor says

finance way on the minds of many here. >> my upperclassmen say they want to go to college but that their parents didn't go and their parents don't have money. i'm being raised by a single parent. the economic challenges are big here. we are part of their free lunch program because all of our students are below the poverty limits. stephanie: maddie told the group they could qualify for serious tuition discounts. >> we do have some schools in the room that will cost $90,000 for a year. before you give up on that, for many of you in this room that $90,000 per year college will cost you zero dollars to go there. stephanie: but for dominguez, raised by a single mother, the idea of traveling out of state is daunting. >> i feel like it would be hard to leave new mexico because i have never been far away from my family. you just start a new chapter in your life and go far from what you have known. stephanie: what do you hope college will mean for your future? >> i hope i can provide more.

not that my mom doesn't provide, but i want to be able to provide for myself and future kids. i want them to not have to worry. stephanie: about 30 miles south of questa, taos high school was the next stop. at that college fair this junior visited every table. >> i want to become a doctor. but i also want to gain experiences of independence and being away from home. stephanie: he has ambitions to go out of state for college even though it would be a big change. >> being part of a small community, when you go to a bigger college, you would definitely feel a culture shock. stephanie: she says that can be a barrier for other students here that are first-generation. >> it is difficult to get here, it is difficult to leave here. culturally, this is a singular state.

leaving new mexico for a first generation student are low income student often means you are the first in your family to experience something that is new where the community looks really different. stephanie: this teacher encourages his students to keep an open mind. >> we have a lot of students that stayed in our community for whom the college path may not have been for them. we want to build the next set of traditions for our students. maybe a four year university or college degree is something to strive for. it is something to value. stephanie: mindset aside, rural students often face academic hurdles. rural college completion rates are 15% lower than urban areas. new mexico ranks last in education among all u.s. states and third to last in child economic well-being. and many rural districts operate on a four day school week with strained budgets. >> these students might not have access to ap classes or dual

enrollment or honors classes, which might at the end of the day, my limits which schools they can even apply to depending on admissions requirements. reporter: dominquez says questa doesn't have as many advanced classes as other places. >> they don't offer that so i feel like it is not enough. stephanie: there are certain courses that they don't offer here. >> yes. stephanie: columbia admissions officer page says they do take into account what resources applicants have access to at their high school. >> that type of contextual information makes my job easier at trying to uncover if the student is doing as much as they can. stephanie: you want to see they are doing as they can within the confines of the curriculum offered at their school? >> exactly. stephanie: bentley from the university of chicago says the schools that came here are committed to improving access. >> these are pretty competitive colleges. to get into. you already have a lot of students applying.

but what we don't have is something representative of the united states as a whole. that is for sure. when we looked at the first analysis of our class we found that 3% of our entire campus was students coming from small-town and rural high schools. more than 30% of the united states are small-town so they were massively underrepresented. stephanie: is that because rural students were not applying, or because they weren't being admitted? >> it was a little of both, but mostly because they were not and we looked at our pipelines, they were pretty scarce. stephanie: bentley leads a network of colleges trying to expand the pipelines and her message to rural students -- >> you are wanted. you are welcome. we value you. you bring an important perspective that a lot of our campuses are missing. and we want to support you. stephanie: bentley has seen progress at her institution where their share of rural students has increased to 9%.

the hope is that these bus doors lead to long-term relationships between rural high schools and top-tier colleges. for the pbs news hour i'm stephanie sy in northern new mexico. ♪ geoff: there are 65 million people in the u.s. who identify as hispanic or latino. but within that large demographic are many different and vibrant cultures. latin america plays a big part in those cultural identies and is predominantly a spanish-speaking region. but younger generations are asking, is language crucial to determining identity? what about those hispanic americans who don't speak spanish, sometimes referred to as "no sabo"? laura barron-lopez tells us more. laura: while language can connect people to their culture and be a source of pride for some, for others, it can bring about embarrassment and anxiety.

according to the pew research center, 78% of u.s. hispanics say it's not necessary to speak the language to identify as latino or to the culture. still, 54% of those who speak very little or no spanish say other latinos have made them feel badly about it. we spoke to latinos around the u.s. who share their spanish speaking journeys with us. take a look. >> i am gracie mercedes and i'm from new york, originally new york city. my family is from dominican republic. >> my name is wendy ramirez and i live in los angeles, california. i identify as latina, indigenous. >> my name is diego payan. i currently reside in northern california. i identify myself as a second generation chicano. >> my name is carmen blanco. i currently reside in greenville, south carolina. i identify as latina. i also identify as african american. >> growing up, my grandmother

would speak spanish to me, i would answer back in english. and, you know, i grew up in the 1980s and 1990s, at a time where assimilation was everything. >> spanish was my first language. by the time that i got to high school, i lost my abily to speak spanish. i couldn't communicate with my mom really. >> my father is from nicaragua. i'm first generation, and my mother is african-american. so i didn't really grow up with it in the household. my father was in that assimilation phase. so english was really important for him. >> growing up, i didn't speak spanish fluently. and it wasn't really until my grandma, my abuela, passed away in 2016 where it really sparked my interest. >> my latin dad has been challenged because of my spanish fluency. i think it's extra hard being an afro-latina, looking the way i do. people don't assume i'm dominican or have a latin background. >> definitely, shame is felt and

given from family members, from community members. and it's not a good feeling. so i have taken it upon myself to learn more because i want to connect with my abuelos, want to connect with family members, and i want to be of service to my comunidad. >> there was always this feeling of being the only family member that was biracial and also not mastering the language. so i definitely felt sometimes ostracized. >> not all latinos speak spanish. some latinos speak portuguese. some latinos speak french. so the fact that we're even saying that you need to speak spanish to be considered latino, i think, to me, is wrong. >> i've always identified as a latino and i've always been around the cultura and the comunidad, >> since i've gotten older, i have recognized that there are different aspects to that culture and that i've been able to connect to the culture, although i may not have that fluency. >> i think as a person of color in the united states, it's often hard to feel truly american

because we are constantly othered and constantly put in a box. and i think that's the experience of so many latinos who are second or first or third generation. >> you know, it's not just the language, the music, the food, the culture, the traditions. i mean, there's a lot of a lot of things that make latinidad. >> not speaking the language does not mean that you're not of value, that you don't matter, that you don't belong. you have to give yourself grace for your story and how that's contributed to where your spanish is today. laura: i'm joined now by mark hugo lopez, director of race and ethnicity research at the pew research center. mark, thank you so much for joining us. mark: thank you. laura: so i'm just going to say right off the bat, i can't speak spanish. i was not taught spanish by my parents. i'm fourth generation mexican-american or chicana, if you will. and many latinos, myself included, feel like they're stuck between two cultures. and a lot of that is

tied to fluency with the spanish language. why is that? mark: well, we are in a moment where in the nation's latino population, 65 million people, you have many who are recent immigrants, who are in many cases spanish dominant. you have many who are the u.s. born children of immigrant parents who grew up speaking both english and spanish and are today fluent in the language. but that fastest growing group of latinos today is actually the group that is of the third or higher generation, meaning they're born in the u.s. to u.s. born parents. and so we're in this mix of refreshing of the population with new immigrants arriving who are spanish speaking, but at the same time a growing, prideful latino population that also speaks mostly english. laura: and in your study and some of the latinos that we spoke to expressed embarrassment if they had the language and lost it or if they were never able to speak spanish and so that they often face jokes or teasing from other latinos who were shaming them for it. i experience that myself. in high

school, other mexican-americans would say i wasn't really mexican because i couldn't speak it. why do you think this is such a common experience? mark: it's a certain amount of street credibility or credibility of are you truly hispanic? well, you're only truly hispanic if you speak spanish. and that has been a common theme. those who are seen as truly of the group have to be spanish speakers close to their immigrant roots and proud of that. you also see it in recent cultural events, like there was an event a couple of years ago where a young boy was interviewed by a spanish language television after a soccer match in los angeles. and the young boy didn't speak spanish. and immediately, you could hear commentary from the studio in the background where people referred to him as a no sabo kid, i don't know kid. and so this is something that's been going on for some time and continues to this day. laura: i want to talk about that no sabo kids trend because that's shaming for not being fluent, right? and no sabo kid is an incorrect translation of i

don't know. so i don't know how to speak spanish. what started as a put down has kind of changed, though. how what what is that new trend? and are some latinos reclaiming their cultural identity through it? mark: absolutely. because, as you noted in from our report, 78% of latino adults tell us that you don't have to speak spanish to be considered latino in the nation today. that's unchanged from about ten years ago, the last time that we asked this. and so you look at this and you see that, yes, there are many latinos who are proud to be latinos to identify and to be part of the culture. and yet at the same time are also proud to say they don't speak spanish. laura: right. so how do different generations and age groups view this? is there a gap when you're asking older latinos versus younger ones? mark: older latinos are more likely to be spanish dominant, particularly if they're immigrants. so that's perhaps no surprise. but you do see that it's the younger latinos that are experiencing this shaming, more so than older latinos, particularly college educated young latinos are the ones who are hearing it most, more than

60% of them will tell us that they have been shamed at some point for not speaking spanish. that really speaks to this as a current phenomenon. it's something that's continuing to go on, but it's impacting young people. another part of this is data from the census bureau, where we see that among those who are latinos for ages 5 to 17, more than half speak only english at home. now you look at older latinos and you'll see 70% plus speak spanish at home. so there's a mismatch here in terms of the next generation and their ability to speak spanish. laura: so many tie hispanic heritage to the spanish language, as you said. but there are some latinos that don't speak the language. they may speak portuguese, other languages. so what about those other languages and how they do or don't fit in to what it means to be hispanic? mark: well, the federal definition of hispanic is one that's very clear about people who trace their roots to the spanish speaking countries of latin america and spain. portuguese countries are not part of that definition. but the colloquial definition or the

general sense among the public is that if you want to be latino, you are latino. and so that includes people of brazilian background. so this is not just a story about spanish speakers. laura: is knowing the language of the culture important to keeping traditions alive? mark: there is a link, in fact, when we've asked latinos about this, more than half will say it is spanish, speaking spanish, that's the most important way you can maintain your cultural links. however, there are many other ways to do it as well. and we also find that many hispanic parents want their kids to speak spanish. but again, going back to the data and the experiences, the proof is, quote unquote in the pudding. many us born latinos are not necessarily picking up spanish or not becoming fluent in it. they may take courses in high school, for example, or college, but don't necessarily become fluent in the language. laura: i would just like to say that my family and i believe yours still has the culture, so it's an important part of the upbringing. but mark hugo lopez of pew research center, thank you for your time. mark: thank you.

♪ amna: and that is the news for hour tonight. i'm amna nawaz. geoff: and i'm geoff bennett. thanks for spending part of your evening with us. >> major funding for the pbs news hour has been provided by. >> on an american cruise line's journey, travelers experience the maritime heritage and culture of the maine coast and new england islands. our fleet of smoke cruise ships explore american landscapes, seaside villages and historic harbors. where you can experience local customs and cuisine. american cruise lines. proud sponsor of pbs news hour. >> i love seeing interns succeed, seeing them come back and join engagement teams and

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the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy.]

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