It is often said that History is written and told by the conqueror to the detriment of those conquered. An article I came across posted by Dan Krieger, professor emeritus of history at Cal Poly, reminded me once again of Latinos’ missing history and the need to correct omissions by ensuring that our story is told-fairly and accurately.

In his posting, Krieger offered the following description of events at San Luis Obispo, California in the early 1850s when the leaders of the county addressed the education challenge of the day… What to do when 43% of student population does not speak English?

“English-born John Michael Price was the first American alcalde, the senior administrative officer for a district stretching along the El Camino Real from north of Santa Barbara to just south of San Jose. On March 9, 1850, Price directed the ayuntamiento, or town council, of San Luis Obispo to create a “school of primary letters.” … The first schoolmaster was Don Guillermo Searle. He was born in Chile to English parents. All lessons were in Spanish. There were no textbooks. Don Guillermo would read a passage from one of his own books. The children would repeat the passage phrase by phrase until they had it memorized. This rote method was used in schools throughout the world prior to the widespread use of the printing press. It is still used in developing countries…”

Several years later, in San Luis Obispo, this methodology evolved to a system that required students to translate their lessons from Spanish into English. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Newsom, a New Yorker, “improved on this system by giving lessons in English, and then compelling students to translate the material into Spanish, and then back into English”.

Nearly 100 years later, Orange County California found itself grappling still with the Spanish question…although this time in a very different manner. In March 1945, Gonzalo Mendez, William Guzman, Frank Palomino, Thomas Estrada, and Lorenzo Ramirez, a group of Latino parents in Orange County, Calif., sued four local school districts for segregating their children in “Mexican schools.” In February 1946, Judge McCormick issued his landmark decision and issued an injunction requiring Westminster to cease and desist segregation of Mexican children. Governor Earl Warren signed legislation prohibiting segregation in California schools in June 1947. This case, supported by LULAC, was also joined by NAACP, AJC and ACLU as friends of the court. Thurgood Marshall, who filed the amicus on behalf of NAACP, would years later use the findings in Mendez to argue Brown v Board of Education.

Yet, the history books used in our schools fail to include any reference to this major civil rights accomplishment. Nor do they mention the systemic tragedies that preceded the filing of this case.

On Sept 13, Justice Marshall’s son, Thurgood Marshall, Jr., member U.S. Postal Service Board of Governors, has taken a major step to correct this oversight as he announced the issuance of a US commemorative stamp to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Mendez decision. I had the privilege of meeting Sylvia Mendez recently and learned how she is now dedicated to correct history books so that our children can learn their history, too. There is a whole movement to recapture Latino history while also raising funds to preserve the school and maintain the legacy.

As I listen to and read about the increasingly disturbing hostility directed towards Latinos in New Jersey and elsewhere, I truly hope that we-regardless of how tired and weary we may be or how much we already think we are doing-continue to uphold the principle that we are all created equal and not fall prey to ignorance. Those that do not know history are most certainly condemned to repeat it. I fear that unless we speak up and out, we will find ourselves exactly where our parents, and theirs, struggled so hard to change for the better. Let us make sure their struggles are recorded, respected and upheld. My grandmother always told me “Mas vale el Diablo por Viejo que por Diablo” - claro porque conoce su historia!

The immigration debate has been an extremely polarizing topic in America. While there is clear consensus that our immigration system is flawed and broken, the solutions have been very divisive. Die-hard radical conservatives would prefer to deport all 12 million undocumented resident while more moderate and mainstream Americans prefer a solution that increases border security but works to integrate the millions of undocumented residents who are currently here and are hard working members of our community. Unfortunately, Congress failed to pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill and it appears that the topic of comprehensive immigration reform will not be brought back up for debate until at the earliest, sometime in 2009 since no one wants to talk about it in an election year.

But what about the thousands of undocumented children who did not come to the U.S. by choice but because they were brought here by their parents? These students find out the hard way that despite good grades in school and a promising academic future, the doors to higher education are closed shut because they are undocumented students and thus have to pay out-of-state tuition. This is one of the biggest ironies since these students often come from the poorest families and they often can’t even afford the in-state tuition, much less the out-of-state tuition. Too many times, I have run into students who came here as early as age 1 and only know New Jersey where they grow up, but they are forced to pay out-of-state tuition when they’re told that they are ineligible for in-state tuition due to their immigration status. That is wrong and the law should be changed.

Currently there is legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate called the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act (also known as The DREAM Act). The DREAM Act would do the following if passed by Congress and signed into law:

• Repeal the federal provision discouraging states to offer in-state tuition to undocumented students, thereby restoring states’ rights.

• Provide a path to citizenship for certain individuals who were brought to the US years ago as undocumented immigrant children.

• Be considered for legal permanent resident status on a conditional basis if they:

• Entered the U.S. prior to the age of 16.

• Have lived in the U.S. for five years by the date the law is enacted.

• Have good moral character (a common term in immigration law), and no criminal record.

• Attained a high school diploma or a GED in the U.S.

• The conditional status would be lifted at the end of six years if the individual has:

• Graduated from an institution of higher education or has completed two years of college in good standing, or

• Served in the U.S. military for two or more years.

• Students who are 12 years or older on the date the law is enacted would be protected from deportation and would be granted work authorization so long as the individual is attending a U.S. K-12 school.

Unfortunately, the DREAM Act (which was part of the comprehensive immigration reform compromise) did not get past the U.S. Senate and has never come up for a vote in the House of Representatives. There was an attempt last month to attach the DREAM Act to the Defense Appropriations Bill, but it did not receive enough votes to withstand threats of filibusters by radical conservatives. Senate Majority Leaders Harry Reid (D-NV) pledged to bring the DREAM Act to the floor for a vote by November 16.

While New Jersey cannot address all of the challenges relating to comprehensive immigration reform, the state CAN address the challenges facing undocumented students residing in New Jersey who are forced to pay out-of-state tuition to attend our institutions of higher learning. Currently, New Jersey does not have a state-equivalent to the DREAM Act that allows undocumented students to enroll in public colleges or universities at in-state tuition rates despite the fact that many of these undocumented students have attended grade school, middle school, and high school, many of which have excelled academically.

While there are identical bills in the New Jersey State Assembly and Senate that would grant in-state tuition to undocumented New Jerseyans, neither bills have gone further than committee discussions. According to the National Immigration Law Center in Washington, DC, there are ten states that have passed legislation to allow undocumented students to enroll in public universities and pay in-state tuition (California, Illinois, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, and Washington).

Why is it so important for New Jersey to pass legislation that allows undocumented students access to in-state tuition rates? Consider this . . .

• Many of New Jersey’s brightest and most promising students are undocumented students and they would otherwise be shut out of a higher education unless in-state tuition is granted.

• In New Jersey, it’s easier for an out-of-state student to get in-state tuition in New Jersey than it is for an undocumented student from New Jersey to do so, even though it is probable that the out-of-state student who got the in-state tuition will likely return to their home state upon graduation and will contribute to the economic prosperity of their home state, thus leaving New Jersey taxpayers high and dry. New Jersey’s undocumented students are more likely to stay in New Jersey and contribute to the state’s economy.

• Granting undocumented students may actually help lower the state’s budget challenges over the long term. A study by the non-profit RAND Corp. showed that a 30-year-old immigrant woman who graduates from college will pay $5,300 more in taxes and cost $3,900 less in government expenses each year than if she had dropped out of high school. This amounts to an annual fiscal benefit of over $9,000 per person every year which is money that can be used to reinvest into the education system for the next generation of New Jersey students. State and local taxpayers have already invested in the education of the undocumented children via our public school system so granting our undocumented students in-state tuition would equate to a great return on taxpayer’s investment.

Revenues for our colleges and universities in New Jersey would likely go up and not down because of the increased number of undocumented students who would enroll in our institutions of higher learning at in-state rates who otherwise would not attend college at all. This may even have the positive impact of reducing the rate of inflation of college tuition rates due to the benefits of economies of scale given the higher revenues generated by the increased enrollment.

New Jersey does NOT have to wait for the DREAM Act to pass. It can follow the lead of the other ten states and allow undocumented students to enroll as soon as the bill passes. As it relates to in-state tuition, The DREAM Act repeals the federal provisions in Section 505 of the Illegal Immigrant Reform and Immigrant Reconciliation Act of 1996 (IIRIRA), which prohibits states from providing any higher education benefit based on residency to undocumented immigrants unless they provide the same benefit to U.S. citizens in the same circumstances, regardless of their residence. This is meant to discourage such in-state tuition policies, BUT IT DOES NOT PROHIBIT IT! It is 100% legal for New Jersey to offer in-state tuition despite Section 505 of the IIRIRA.

If the DREAM Act passes Congress and becomes law, that is still not the end of the story. Even if the DREAM Act is passed and signed into law, it doesn’t automatically grant in-state tuition. It will simply remove the discouraging barriers as mentioned in Section 505 of the IIRIRA. So New Jersey would still have to act by passing in-state tuition legislation for our undocumented New Jersey students.

As such, I am calling on the New Jersey Legislature do the right thing and pass in-state tuition legislation for our undocumented student community, so that New Jersey can allow all of our best and brightest students regardless of immigration status to flex their academic muscles in New Jersey’s public colleges and universities. While we cannot control what Congress will do with the DREAM Act, I find absolutely no reason that the New Jersey State Legislature cannot pass such legislation in this session.

There has been talk of passing such legislation in New Jersey for years, but the state has not done so. I believe that such legislation would have the support of Governor Jon Corzine and a bi-partisan delegation of the State Assembly and Senate. However, while the bill languishes in committee, the school year 2007-2008 has commenced and it will be another year that promising young students will be left out in the cold with no capacity to pay astronomically high out-of-state fees. I, as many of you believe, that our children, regardless of immigration status are our treasures and our greatest asset. Let’s practice what we preach and do the right thing and pass in-state tuition legislation for our undocumented students before the end of the year so that they can attend college and fulfill the great promise of the Garden State to plant the seeds of success in all of our youth, regardless of immigration status, so that the garden of New Jersey’s youth reap great fruits that will make all New Jersey proud.

My message to the New Jersey Legislature: Pass in-state tuition legislation for our undocumented students before the end of the year!

As a Latina scholar, activist and leader, I am very proud of the many accomplishments, triumphs and progress made by our Latino community in our State of New Jersey. After all, I am a product of the 70’s and 80’s — a generation of Latinos who grew up demanding social justice and equity. I was part of a cadre of Latino leaders who fought for inclusion and challenged the establishment to have a voice in government, legislature, and the courts. We demanded equal treatment and inclusion for college students, migrant workers, women, families and children. It was an era of progress, nationalist pride, and enlightment. We had wonderful role models, like Judge Joseph Rodriguez, Dr. Hilda Hidalgo, Dr. Maria Canino, Hector Rodriguez, to name a few. They were the pioneers and servant leaders who gave so much for our community and in their quest for justice and access, they were able to change the public discourse about who we were as a community and position our interests at the forefront of institutional and governmental agendas.

While there have been some gains in terms of Latino representation in government, higher education, etc., these gains have not been reflected in the leadership sphere. At all levels, we still have not been able to reach important mainstream executive and managerial posts. In essence, we can say that we have gone backwards in gaining access to positions of leadership, thus marginalizing our participation and levels of influence. This trend is very present in higher education, where the numbers of Latinos serving in academic leadership positions is abysmal. This level of disregard for nurturing and promoting Latino advancement in higher education is also seen in the low numbers of inclusion of Latinos at all levels of higher education students, faculty, governing boards, professional & administrative jobs. Leonard Valverde (2004) argues that this situation “results in Latino individuals not having the same influence as their White peers. This influential status is the result of placing a lesser value on Latinos. Such value is based on faulty perceptions held by society in general about Latinos and their culture.”

The underpresentation of Latinos in higher education continues to be a critical issue for our community, since education is the key to progress and the future of our community lies on its success in building capacity at all levels. The education pipeline is the most important factor in building such capacity, hence a determining factor in the ensuring that Latinos can move into the leadership spheres in this country. This shameful underrepresentation extends to all industries. How many Latinos do we know are leading banks or corporations in the private sector? How many Latinos can we count are leading public schools, as principals or school districts as superintendents? How many Latinos serve as heads of state departments or federal offices? Without having to cite too much data and research, we all know that we only have handful and that while there has been some progress in hiring teachers, and entry level professionals, the pipeline for reaching positions of leadership and influence keep narrowing.

The rapid demographic changes in the US and the unprecedented growth in the Hispanic population makes our time, the right time for doing what is necessary to ensure a more hopeful scenario for the future of Latinos. Latinos are the largest ethnic minority group in the United States with 46.6 million Hispanics in the United States as of July 1, 2005. By 2009, nearly one person out of every six in the United States will be of Hispanic origin. By July 1, 2050 it is projected that there will be 102.6 million Hispanics in the United States, making Latinos 24% of the nation’s total population. (U.S. Census Bureau, 2006)

Today, the Hispanic population distribution impacts all major urban and suburban areas of the U.S. and is the largest non-white group in 26 states, including New Mexico, where Hispanic are 43% of the population; California and Texas, where they make up more than a 1/3 of the population; and states like Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Texas and Washington where the number of Hispanic exceeds half million. The Latino population growth is not reflected in higher education. In fact, Latinos are the least represented population in our colleges and universities, whether as administrators, faculty or students; and as students have one of the highest levels of attrition. While we often think about higher education as progressive and liberal, the reality is that as a whole our colleges and universities have failed “to walk the talk.”

Opening access to Latinos, assuring their existence as students in higher education, and their increased presence among college faculty, administration and governing boards is of paramount importance to the economic and political survival of our community. Addressing these issues will take institutional and individual changes.

What can be done to address the issues of Latino underrepresentation in leadership roles in higher education

Cristina Gonzalez (2007) argues that “to have greater Latino representation among academic leaders, there must be a multipronged effort by institutions of higher learning, the Hispanic community and Latino faculty members who wish to become academic administrators.” At the institutional level, college and universities need to institute mechanisms for retaining existing Latino faculty and providing the institutional opportunities for advancement. It is in the best interest of universities, including our own state university, Rutgers to create pipelines for Latino advancement that are backed with institutional support for fellowships, institutional leadership programs, mentoring, research support, attractive salary packages. If our institutions are serious abut the need to include Latinos at all levels, then they need to develop aggressive recruitment and retentions plans that include strategies for bringing Latinos, as well as strategies for keeping them. These strategies must reflect an understanding of the value that Latinos bring to academia in all areas, not just to departments such as Latino American Studies or Spanish, but also to other fields, including the math and sciences. Institutions of higher learning must steer away from the practice of tokenism-hiring Latinos to fulfill multiple roles, hence limiting their time for engaging in the kinds of scholarly activities that lead to promotion within higher education (research, publishing, teaching). Diaz (2007) concludes that the revolving door for Latinos in higher education administration is the result of a number of factors, mainly resulting from the fact that “Latino scholars are not hired for the same reasons as White academics are”, rather they are often hired to fill “minority slots”, or as a response to a “crisis of some sort”, and therefore they are disposed of once the “the pressure eases”.

As individuals, our Latino scholars need to be vigilant of their roles, they need to take advantage of every opportunity that can elevate their academic repertoire and they need to maintain close ties to the larger Latino advocacy networks to ensure that there are synergies in launching comprehensive strategies to address these issues. The Latino community and advocacy leadership needs to maintain the pressure on institutions of higher learning and cannot let the guard down. Often in the celebration of small victories, we tend to forget the larger issues and we end up losing ground.

How can one tell if Attorney General Anne Milgram did the right thing when she recently issued a directive to all police officers in New Jersey to report to federal authorities certain people they suspect are here in violation of immigration laws? Easy - both sides of the immigration debate are unhappy with the Attorney General’s directive, but not so unhappy as to take to the streets over the issue, or even level personal attacks on our new Attorney General. She did the right thing.

To understand how the Attorney General could accomplish such a feat, first examine the context in which she issued her directive. It had less to do with the murders of the three college students in Newark and the disclosure that one of the suspects in that case is an undocumented immigrant, than with the fact that, without such a directive, law enforcement officers all over the state were doing nothing or whatever they thought was appropriate when they came in contact with undocumented immigrants. In other words, the lack of uniform rules had led to disparate practices and results, an intolerable situation that required appropriate remedial action by the top law enforcement officer in this state. So, the Attorney General had to act, and she did.

On the substance of her action, she has been criticized by groups sympathetic to immigrants, such as The Latino Leadership Alliance, for not including more objective criteria in her directive. Those on the other side of the debate, those who favor deporting as many of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in this country as possible, have criticized the Attorney General for not going far enough: they would have her seek to deputize every police officer in the state to act as federal immigration and customs enforcement officers with power to arrest anyone suspected of immigration violations.

The criticism of the latter group ignores the reality that this country’s economy, and New Jersey’s economy in particular, would be crippled if not destroyed by mass deportations of those who wash our dishes and cars, care for our children, pick our blueberries, etc., etc., etc. Furthermore, their criticism is blind to the fact that our criminal justice system would crumble under the weight of mass arrests of that magnitude.

As to those like LLA who argue for more lenient or sympathetic treatment of immigrants, their criticism of the Attorney General’s directive ignores the fact that the devil is in the details, which makes it impossible to incorporate all desired or even necessary details in the first directive in this state to address this issue.

I urge both sides to give the Attorney General the space and the time to develop the criteria by which she will be able to determine whether her directive leads to the desired uniformity in enforcement. At the same time I urge the Attorney General to keep under close scrutiny those departments that may be tempted to read more into her directive than what it says. I’m referring here to departments whose leaders have announced a desire to deputize their members to act as ICE agents, for example. Close monitoring of the implementation of the directive in the next few months, coupled with scrutiny of the process in those few departments who resist or abuse their powers in enforcing the directive will inevitably show what steps should be taken to fine-tune the directive. The Attorney General has shown by her actions that she is receptive to suggestions on how to improve the directive to achieve the goals of uniformity and ensuring the safety of all our communities. Give her room to do her job. How minority and immigrant communities in New Jersey are treated by and relate to law enforcement will depend in large part on whether she succeeds in this effort. Those communities in particular should stand ready to help in this endeavor.

So I was thinking what can I constantly write about on my blog? How can I can I sum up my experiences as a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV) in Ukraine? There are so many things to write about, especially now, since I have been in country for more than a year.

In country, I have friends, I’m implementing various projects simultaneously and I’m a member of Peace Corps Multicultural Awareness Committee. Plus, I am scheduled to take the GMAT on October 15^th in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. So studying for this exam is going to take a big chunk of my time for the next two months.

My activities are plentiful, but I don’t think I can write about all of them all the time. For one, that would probably be boring; imagine reading updates of someone’s life every day or two. I’m not even sure if that would qualify as autobiographical. And second, I noticed that there isn’t something to write about everyday. Good things (and bad things) happen in spurts and they are usually hard to predict.

Instead, I decided to write about all the things occurring in my life as it occurs. There are some projects which I am really excited about like creating a Business Center and starting a Little League at my site (the town where I live). Pryluky (the site) has only a few after school activities for children. I am working with Basil Tarasko, a scout who works with the San Diego Padres, and Vasyl Gregorovich, a sportsman in the City Council, to start a Little League Baseball organization. Right now, we have twenty out of the fifty children that are necessary to start the league. The City Council has even decided to cover the cost for a baseball diamond.

Being of Dominican descent, this is quiet an accomplishment. After all, baseball is the sport of the Latino Caribbean people. I know that my father would be proud to know that I am spreading the game of baseball half way across the globe.

So little briefs, like the project above, is a great way to introduce all of the people in my life and the projects I am working on. Also, sometimes I get philosophical. I never realized until I was in country how much of an impact the Greek philosophers like Socrates, Plato and Aristotle had on me. My alma mater, the College of New Jersey, really showed me how to appreciate these great minds. Being philosophical allows to reflect on my experience and to ask myself, “What’s next?”

One of the greatest contradictions of our time is that in an era of unprecedented wealth in our nation and our state, we have demonstrated little capacity or inclination as a society to eradicate poverty. The federal poverty thresh hold, is $20,650 for a family of four. Stop and think about that: A family of four in our state living on $20,650 a year.

And we all know that New Jersey is a high cost state. The New Jersey Poverty Research Institute created a Self Sufficiency Standard to measure how much income is needed for a family to adequately meet its basic needs without assistance. The Self Sufficiency Standard requires a minimum income of over 200% of the federal poverty level.

By this measure, income inadequacy in NJ stands at over 21% of the state’s population, more than 1.8 million people. Even more alarming, almost 340,000 people, 4% of the population, experiences severe poverty: Measured by an annual income of less than half the official poverty level.

One-million-eight-hundred-thousand people are not a statistic. We are speaking of one-million-eight-hundred-thousand lives. It is over one million children who face hunger and despair; children who dream the same dreams as our children and grandchildren. Who have the same hopes.

And at the same time, New Jersey’s Gross State Product stands at approximately $453 Billion. To put this in perspective, if we were a nation, we would have the world’s 17th largest economy, ahead of countries such as Belgium ($371 B), Switzerland ($367 B) and Sweden ($358B). If we were a nation, with our per capita income of over $60,000, New Jersey would be considered the wealthiest country in the world.

Until her death in 1997, Mother Teresa continued her work among the poor. Honors too numerous to mention came her way throughout the years. The world seemed amazed by her dedication to those deemed of little value to society…Astounded that one small, frail woman stood up against a sea of suffering and pushed back the flood-tides for so many.
She best described her life’s work with the following words: “It is not how much we do, but how much love we put in the doing. It is not how much we give, but how much love we put in the giving.” She demonstrated that each of us has the capacity to make a difference.

Every Sunday in Sacred Heart Church in Camden, Monsignor Michael Doyle and his congregation say a prayer for the city:

“Almighty God, we praise you for all you have done. Help us with all that you want us to do! Come, Holy Creator, and rebuild the City of Camden so that we do not labor in vain without you. Come, Holy Savior, and heal all that is broken in our lives and in our streets. Come Holy Spirit, and inspire us with energy and willingness to rebuild Camden City to your honor and Glory.”

This prayer is not just about Camden. It is about those throughout our state who are in need; it is about our capacity to bring the light of hope into their lives.