In this episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? we focus on the Alliance of Hispanic Serving Institution Educators (AHSIE), learn about the history, role, and purpose of the organization, and encourage everyone to get involved. I talk to the inaugural Executive Director Dr. Yolanda Cataño and the current president Dr. Paloma Vargas. Yolanda and Paloma have been heavily involved in AHSIE and give us an inside look at the organization. They also talk about this year’s 15th annual best practices conference entitled, La Quinceañera: Celebrando Crecimiento, Past, Present and Future and why HSI educators should attend.

Guests: 

Dr. Yolanda Cataño (she, her, ella), AHSIE Executive Director, Alliance of Hispanic Serving Institution Educators 

Twitter: @YolandaCatano | Instagram: @ahsieed | Facebook: Yolanda Cataño | LinkedIn: Yolanda Cataño

Dr. Paloma Vargas (she/they/ella), President, Alliance of Hispanic Serving Institution Educators  

Instagram: @iheartamoeba

Show notes: 

https://www.ahsieconference.org/

In the first episode of season 2 of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? I talk to Dra. Blanca E. Vega, Assistant Professor of Higher Education, Montclair State University, about a variety of important topics including racial conflict as an organizational dilemma in HSIs, supporting Black students in HSIs, and complicating Latinidad in HSIs. Her research situates racism as one of multiple barriers that can impact higher education experiences and success, not just for students but also for administrators and faculty. In this episode we talk about her research on racial conflict, policymaking concerning undocumented students, Latinidad in higher education, and HSIs as racialized organizations.

Guest: Dra. Blanca E. Vega (she/her/ella), Assistant Professor of Higher Education, Montclair State University

Social Media: Twitter: @blancavnyc | Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/blanca-e-vega-8a551210/

Show notes: 

Vega, B. E., Liera, R., & Boveda, M. (2022). Hispanic-Serving Institutions as racialized organizations: Elevating intersectional consciousness to reframe the “H” in HSI. AERA Open, 8(1), 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1177/23328584221095074

Vega, B. E. (2021). “What is the real belief on campus?” Perceptions of racial conflict at a minority-serving institution and a historically White institution. Teachers College Record, 123(9), 144–170.

Vega, B. E. (2019). Lessons from an administrative closure: The curious case of Black space at an MSI. Frontiers in Education, 3(88), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2018.00088

For the final episode of the inaugural season of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? I talk to Dra. Maribel Jiménez about one of the most significant processes that all higher education institutions engaging in, the strategic planning process. Yet Maribel centers HSIs in her conversations about strategic planning while acknowledging that the process is mostly race-neutral and dominated by white ways of practicing higher education. She shares insight into making this process about Latinx students and HSIs, guided by the findings from her dissertation. As a practitioner and alumna of an HSI, Yakima Valley College, she also discusses her insights into effectively implementing servingness in practice while also being critical of dominant practices in higher education. 

Guest: Maribel Jiménez (she/her/ella), Dean of Academic Transfer Pathways and Partnerships, Highline College

Social media: Twitter: @LaDoctoraMJ | Instagram: @maribeltorresjimenez | LinkedIn: Maribel Jimenez, Ed.D

Show Notes:

• Flores, A. & Leal, D. R. (2020). Beyond enrollment and graduation: Examining strategic plans from Hispanic-Serving Institutions in Texas. Journal of Latinos and Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/15348431.2020.1791121

As we continue down our journey to learn about servingness, this episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? features Dra. Marla Franco who is the inaugural Assistant Vice Provost for HSI Initiatives at the University of Arizona. She shares insight into the intentional ways she implements servingness con cariño and offers best practices. She shares details about the HSI Fellows Program, which has not only become a vehicle for advancing servingnesss on campus, but also serves as a retention tool for faculty and staff on campus. She also talks about the AZ HSI Consortium and the importance of having a collective group of HSI leaders at the state level, while acknowledging some of the challenges and opportunities of being an HSI in Arizona.

Guest:

Marla Franco (she/her/hers/ella), Assistant Vice Provost, HSI Initiatives, University of Arizona

Social media: @marla_franco, marla-franco, dr.marla.franco, Marla Franco

Show Notes:

https://hsi.arizona.edu/

Franco, M. A., & Hernández, S. (2018). Assessing the capacity of Hispanic Serving Institutions to serve Latinx students: Moving beyond compositional diversity. In D. Zerquera, I. Hernández, & J. G. Berumen (Eds.), New directions for institutional research: Assessment and social justice: Pushing through paradox (pp. 57–71). Wiley.

Franco, M. A., Lozano, G. I., & Subbian, V. (2020). HSIs and community partners: A framework for strengthening servingness through engagement. In G. A. Garcia (Ed.), Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs) in Practice: Defining “Servingness” at HSIs (pp. 151-172). Information Age Publishing.

This episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? features a dynamic duo, Dra. Yolanda Cataño, Executive Director of the Alliance of HSI Educators (AHSIE) and Dr. Ángel de Jesus González, Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Southern California, who extend notions of servingness to queer and trans Latinx peoples at HSIs. They talk about the importance of centering the intersectional identities of Latinxs at HSIs and share findings from three articles they have published about queering HSIs. While centering LGBTQIA+ people in their storytelling, they talk about their own experiences attending HSIs, describe the complexities of data-driven decision-making at community colleges, and talk about institutional and state level policies that affect sevingness. This duo drops intersectional, practical, and empirical knowledge about HSIs and servingness.

Guests

Yolanda Cataño (she/her/ella), Executive Director, Alliance of Hispanic Serving Institution Educators (AHSIE)

Twitter: @YolandaCatano, Instagram: @becomingdracatano, LinkedIn: Yolanda Cataño

Ángel de Jesus González (he/they/elle), Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Southern California

Twitter: @dr_Adj_gonzalez

Show Notes 

• Cataño, Y. & Gonzalez, A. (2021). Examining servingness at California community college Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) for LGBTQ+ Latinx students. Journal of the Alliance for Hispanic Serving Institution Educators, 1(1), 55-72.

This episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? features Dr. Jarett Lujan who serves as the inaugural Director for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Texas A&M University- Kingsville. Dr. Lujan provides us with an exclusive look at his dissertation findings which used a counter-story approach to critically evaluate the Hispanic-serving identity of an emerging HSI through the eyes of Latine students. In addition to his research, he talks about how his extensive experience serving as president of the Student Government Association, as an admissions counselor, as a coordinator for student activities, and as the first Hispanic Student Regent of the Texas Tech University System informs his DEI practice at an HSI in South Texas.

Guest: Jarett Lujan (he/him/his), Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, Texas A&M University-Kingsville

Twitter @drjarettlujan

Show Notes: 

Lujan, J. T. (2022). Through the eyes of the Latine student: Visual representations of racialized experiences within spaces of an emerging Hispanic-serving institution campus. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Texas Tech University.

We turn the focus to Hispanic-Serving Community Colleges (HSCCs) for this episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? with Dr. Erin Doran who is an associate professor in the School of Education at Iowa State University. She is a 3-time graduate of the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA), which has an extensive history as an HSI that Erin documented, highlighting the intentional way that the university set out to serve Latinx students. Her experience at UTSA and her accumulated five years of experience as a community college adjunct is highly influential on her outlook as a teacher and informs much of her research about Latina/o/x students, community colleges; college learning and teaching; and ethnic studies.

Guest: Erin Doran (she/her), Associate Professor, Iowa State University

Twitter: @ErinDoran_EdD

Show Notes: 

erindoranedd.com

Doran, E.E. (2015). Negotiating access and tier one aspirations: The historical evolution of a striving Hispanic-serving institution. The Journal of Hispanic Higher Education, 14(4), 343-354. https://doi.org/10.1177/1538192715570638 SJR 1.01

Doran, E.E., & Medina, Ø. (2017). The intentional and the grassroots Hispanic-Serving Institutions: A critical history of two universities. Association of Mexican American Educators Journal, 11(3), 29-49. https://doi.org/10.24974/amae.11.3.360

Doran, E.E. (2017). An empowerment framework for Latinx students in developmental education. Association of Mexican American Educators Journal, 11(2), 133-154. https://doi.org/10.24974/amae.11.2.353 

Doran, E.E. (2020). How Hispanic should Hispanic-serving institutions be? The Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership, 23(4), 104-114. https://doi.org/10.1177/1555458920947751 

Doran, E.E. (2021). Situating Chicana/o/x Studies programs on community college campuses. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 1-13. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1080/10668926.2021.1877215 

In this episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? I talk to Dra. Gabriela Kovats Sánchez who is a Faculty Scholar for the Native Resource Center at San Diego State University and lecturer for the department of American Indian Studies. She offers a wealth of knowledge as she works at the nexus of research and praxis in her formal roles within the university and voluntary roles in the community. Her research focuses on the experiences of diasporic Indigenous Latinx students and nuances the way we think about Latinidad. Her research, pedagogies, and community engagement are deeply tied to her long-time involvement with and for Ñuu Savi/Mixtec communities in California, and she offers us guidance and advice for being intentional in our work with Indigenous students at HSIs.

*Note from the host: In the introduction to this episode, I incorrectly stated that the episode would be released on Indigenous Peoples' Day, October 10, 2012 (it should be 2022).

Guest: Gabriela Kovats Sánchez (she/her/ella/meeña)

Faculty Scholar, Native Resource Center & Lecturer, American Indian Studies, San Diego State University 

Twitter: @ KovatsSanchez

Instagram: @drakovats

Show Notes:

https://kovatssanchez.weebly.com/ 

Kovats Sánchez, G. (2018). Reaffirming Indigenous Identity: Understanding Experiences of Stigmatization and Marginalization among Mexican Indigenous College Students. Journal of Latinos and Education. 1–14.

Kovats Sánchez, G. (2021). “If we don’t do it, nobody is going to talk about it”: Indigenous Students Disrupting Monolithic Notions of Latinidad at Hispanic Serving Institutions. American Educational Research Association (AERA) Open Journal. https://doi.org/10.1177/23328584211059194

Herrera, F. & Kovats Sánchez, G. (2022). Curando La Comunidad [Healing the Community]: Community-Centered STEM Identity. Journal of Hispanic Higher Education. https://doi.org/10.1177/15381927211069543

Steinman, E. & Kovats Sánchez, G. (2021). Magnifying and Healing Colonial Trauma in Higher Education: Persistent Settler Colonial Dynamics at the Indigenizing University. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education.

In our first multi-guest episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? I had the honor of sharing space with members of the Portland State University’s HSI Exploratory Committee: Óscar Fernández, Carrie Vasquez, Joe Rivera Soto, & Martín Alberto Gonzalez. We talk about the process of becoming an HSI and the intentional ways that PSU is engaging this process. Our guests talk about the challenges of becoming an HSI and the ways that they have worked with students, and especially undocumented students, as part of this process. We also talk about the unique aspects of becoming an HSI in the Pacific Northwest, an area that has not been covered in HSI research.

Guests:

Portland State University’s HSI Exploratory Committee

Óscar Fernández (he, él), Twitter @OscarPdx82

Carrie Vasquez (they, she), Linkedin: carrievasquez

Joe Rivera Soto (he, him) 

Martín Alberto Gonzalez (he, him, his), T: @Scholar4rmOx | IG: @martymoose

Show Notes:

https://www.pdx.edu/news/psu-emerging-hispanic-serving-institution

In the third episode of ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? we continue talking about policy with a more focused look at state-level policies and how they affect servingness. Our guest Dra. Ishara Casellas Connors is an assistant professor of government & public administration at Texas A&M University. Her research examines the implications of DEI policies for advancing racial equity for minoritized students. In this episode we talk about how these DEI policies can help or hinder servingness with HSIs. She also talks to us about how these policies allow for or hinder institutions to focus on intersectional servingness, and gives us a sneak preview of her evolving research that centers Afro-Latinx students.

Guest: Dr. Ishara Casellas Connors (she/her), Assistant Professor, Texas A&M University

Twitter: @isharacc

Show Notes

Casellas Connors, I. (2021). Constructing a monolith: State policy, institutional DEI plans, and the flattening of Latinx identity at Hispanic-serving institutions. AERA Open, 7(1), 1-16. https://doi.org/10.1177/23328584211063872

Casellas Connors, I. (under review). Policy implications of racial discourse: Florida’s public Hispanic Serving Institutions.