Being a professor comes with a certain 
 level of responsibility, because that's a 
 really privileged position, right? I'm a 
 first-generation college student ,I don't 
 come from, you know, sort of a family 
 where my grandparents and great 
 grandparents and great-grandparents went 
 to college. Being a 
 professor of color, being a Chicano 
 professor for me means that I have a 
 real responsibility to the community 
 that I come from. I have a responsibility 
 to use the opportunities that I've been 
 given. The education that I've been able 
 to access to try and bring about a 
broader good in society.
I'm an assistant professor in the Department of 
 leadership studies here in the School of    Education. 
 So I teach ,my primary affiliation is in 
 the HESA program which is higher 
 education and student affairs, so the 
 majority of the courses that I teach are 
 in that HESA program, But I also teach 
 in the broader ONL program and in the 
 general ed program here in the School of 
 Education. My background is actually in 
 social and cultural studies in education, 
 that's what my degree is in. I have lived 
 in the Bay Area since 1996 which is when 
 I graduated from high school. So I 
 graduated from high school, I came up to 
 UC Berkeley as an undergraduate student, 
 spent four years there did community 
 work for a few years, worked at a 
 nonprofit in Oakland for the intervening 
 years and then came back to graduate 
 school, also at UC Berkeley. 
 So the way that I ended up at USF was 
 that I really wanted to be, you know, I 
 was at a very research intensive 
 University, which was UC Berkeley and I 
 was also at a really teaching intensive 
 University at San Jose State, and there 
 were a lot of, both of those experiences 
 that I really loved and I knew that I 
 wanted to be in a place where both 
 research and teaching were really valued. 
 I grew up in a family with really clear 
 sets of ideas around justice and 
 fairness. I want to help contribute to a 
 more just conversation about immigration 
 reform in this country. I want to be a 
 part of the work that's happening on the 
 ground to bring about more humane and 
 just policies for immigrants and 
 immigrant families. I also am involved in 
 work here on campus that's about trying 
 to make USF a more just place as well, so 
 I'm the chair of the Task Force on 
 services and support for undocumented 
 students here at USF, working with a 
 group of faculty staff and students 
 across the campus to think about how USF 
 can be a more welcoming place for 
 undocumented students. So for me, you know, 
 making a difference is really about 
 using whatever foothold we have, wherever 
 we're located, to be able to sort of push 
 that door a little bit more widely open 
 and that's what I try and do. I love 
 teaching, I love walking into the 
 classroom, I love seeing the kind of 
 transformation that happens when 
 students come into a classroom unsure 
 about their abilities or unsure about 
 their ideas and seeing the kind of 
 transformation that happens over the 
 course of a semester. I love that, I love 
 teaching and I love working with    students. 
 I want to prepare my students to be 
 changemakers in higher education because 
 we know that it's an institution that is 
 fraught with questions of equity and 
 access. I want my students to be a part 
 of changing those kinds of policies and 
 practices  .