I have always known that I wanted to be a teacher. From as far back as I could remember, my family taught me the importance of getting a good education. They shared with me details about the various doors that would be opened to me by having a good education. I vowed then and there that, not only would I always strive to further my own education but that I would also do everything in my power to make education accessible to others. Unfortunately, education has been denied historically to groups of people for a variety of reasons including religion, race, cultural background, and even socioeconomic status. Although we have made much progress in this area, there is still a significant difference in the numbers of minority students who are graduating from High School in comparison to other ethnic groups. As a matter of fact, 41% of Latino students and 23% of African American students DO NOT graduate from High School.* There are many reasons for this such as the fact … [Read more...]
I Decide My Cultural Identity!
This past week, I had a very interesting conversation on Pinterest with a complete stranger that was very confusing to me. In essence, I was told that I have no right to refer to myself as a Latina because I am of Spanish heritage and Spaniards are Europeans and, therefore, not allowed to use this title. Huh? That is exactly what I was asking myself. Never in my life has another person presumed to tell me how I should label myself culturally. I really felt offended because I have always identified myself with my Latin roots and I resented the fact that she was trying to separate me from everything that I have ever felt connected to or have identified with. I have always been raised to be proud of my heritage and to appreciate the ties that all Spanish-speaking people have to one another, regardless of what country they originated from. Plus, if we want to get into semantics, the definition of a Latino is anyone who speaks a language that is derived from Latin. This … [Read more...]
Let’s Talk About Race
A few days ago, I was speaking to someone on Twitter who shared with me that a close friend of hers had referred to her daughter using a racial epitaph. Her daughter is biracial and her friend made the comment in jest and thought it was really funny and witty. I would rather not repeat the comment that she made, however, I think that it is important that you see exactly what she said so you can understand why it is so shocking. This "friend" actually referred to her daughter as a "nigglet." I'm sure you are as appalled as I was when I first read that she had the nerve to say this. I can connect to this, unfortunately. My husband has brown skin as he is of Cuban and Jamaican descent. My children are light skinned and have light eyes like me. We are raising our boys not to see skin color but it is really hard when people in society are so ignorant and biased. There have been many times when strangers have made comments about how surprised they were that my … [Read more...]
