Hispanics outnumber others in Montgomery early grades Concerns increased for Hispanic students in particular when recent data from SAT college entrance exams showed a 32-point drop in overall scores for Hispanic students, at a time when students from all county groups saw a three-point dip. In the spring, the Montgomery County Council's Office of Legislative Oversight issued a report showing that fewer than 20 percent of black and Latino eighth-graders scored at advanced levels on 2012 state math exams, while more than 60 percent of white and Asian students did. The new county numbers, released Tuesday, show that a school system widely known for its affluence and high-achieving high schools is home to a diminishing share of white students and a rapidly growing group of Hispanic students. The latest figures, from September enrollment, show that Hispanic kindergartners and first-graders represent 30.7 percent of students in those grades, outnumbering the next-largest group, non-Hispanic white students, who account for 30 percent. County school officials first noted the shift with last year's kindergartners. This year's enrollment numbers showed the same pattern, in larger numbers, said Bruce Crispell, director of the division of long-range planning for Montgomery schools. Crispell said the figures show the leading edge of a trend he expects to continue over the coming decade. "It certainly looks as if over time we're going to become a district where the largest share of enrollment will be Hispanic," Crispell told the county school board Tuesday, when he presented the data. In a school system already focused on the achievement gap between racial and ethnic groups, the new numbers may further concentrate attention on students with fewer advantages. "People continue to think Montgomery County is this wealthy white enclave, but the reality is much different," said School Superintendent Joshua P. Starr. In an interview Tuesday, Starr said the school system has a number of efforts aimed at addressing the achievement gap, adding that broad descriptions of student groups mask individual differences. In general, he said, the challenge is "drilling down and knowing every child and having a plan for that child." Starr said the district has been actively working on behalf of all students and preparing for the demographic shift: "We don't need to do anything radically different." State Del. Ana Sol Gutierrez (D-Montgomery), who was the first Hispanic member of Montgomery's school board in the 1990s, said the shift results from "a long-coming phenomenon" and underscores student needs that require more attention.