A Latina in academia: My individual experience
Anyway, I had a great time in school and thrived from an early age. I was involved in many extra-curricular activities, from Girl Scouts when I was a kid and then the newspaper, yearbook, etc. in high school. Though I didn’t realize it at the time, it was a tremendous boon to have parents who already were so familiar with the American educational system, having gone through it themselves. As I mentioned in my mother’s day post, I had a mother who did not bow down to any authority figure, so whenever a boneheaded administrator or teacher seemed to be unfair to me in the slightest way, she was on the phone with the principal that every afternoon. As a result, I grew up feeling…well, “entitled” isn’t the right word, but at least empowered to speak up for myself. Like that time in 11th grade when I wrote an angry letter to my math teacher who had the nerve to say that I did not belong in his class. “Teachers are supposed to encourage student learning, not shut it down!” I huffily explained to him.
From an early age, I received the message that I would go on to college–and that not doing so was not an option, as my mom was so bitter about never having the chance to pursue her education after high school. It wasn’t just my mom–my teachers were supportive and believed in me, as well. When I began applying for and winning college scholarships, there was some blowback: For example, My own best friend ruefully wished that there were scholarships for “average white girls” like her. Such comments made it clear that some people assumed I was winning these opportunities only because of my race, rather than the fact that I had taken all honors courses, studied hard and earned excellent grades and had a well-rounded profile with all my activities and whatnot.
Yet being the first in my family to apply to college was still a challenge. I picked schools haphazardly, mainly because I liked the idea of them, and without any real knowledge of how my parents would afford to send me there. For instance, I applied to Georgetown because I imagined it would be exciting to get involved in political culture and to work as an intern (and thank god I didn’t go, because I just might have been another Monica Lewinsky). I was also interested in Oberlin because the editor-in-chief of my favorite magazine, Sassy, often wrote about her time there. In the end, I was fortunate to get accepted to an excellent, private research university not far from home. My mom worked at a company affiliated with the university, so as her daughter, I automatically got a half-tuition reduction, and then I won a competitive scholarship from her same company to cover the other half. It worked out, because that just left my room & board to be paid for, and my parents and I took out subsidized student loans to cover those expenses.
At my college, Latin@s were a small minority–perhaps 3% of the total student body. This was not a shocking environment for me; in fact, it was what I was used to, having been the only Mexican girl in all of my classes from K-12. When I found out there was one Latin@ student organization on campus, I was thrilled! It was the most Latin@s I’d ever seen outside my family gatherings. However, I was in for a major shock when some of those urban Latinas looked at me and said, “You grew up in the suburbs?! You don’t speak Spanish?! You shop at The Gap?!” To them, I was not a “real” Latina, and I was hurt to be rejected by my own people. Over time, I made friends with people in the group. Some didn’t have as much scholarship as I did and had to do work-study to support themselves, but overall we all had the fortunate of being full-time students, living on campus, involved in activities, getting wasted at frat parties…you know, the full college experience.
It just so happened that when I entered my freshman year, this university had just hired a young Latino professor who did the same kind of work I wanted to do. With the help of his mentorship over the next four years, I entered the graduate school track. I had the special support of a program meant to encourage talented minority students to consider becoming professors in underrepresented fields. I had the chance to undertake my own research project and prepare a strong application for graduate school.
It worked: after taking a year off as a break from school, I was accepted into a Ph.D. program at another elite, private university, with several years of funding and very little teaching. And the program was great: almost all my faculty and colleagues were people of color doing cutting-edge work. We were blessed to be at a well-to-do university with a huge endowment that could provide incredible intellectual enrichment and networking through workshops, speakers, research opportunities. I received a truly world-class education.
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