My first week as Doctora Audrey Baca had me reflecting on the past few years. I started the doctoral program in educational leadership at California State University, San Bernardino in 2016 with the hope that I would make a difference in creating a more just education system. In May 2019, I successfully defended my dissertation with the knowledge that we have much work left to do. This shift in perspective came from considering what “I” had to do alone to what “we” must do together. My experiences with the American Association of Hispanics in Higher Education (AAHHE) and as a graduate fellow reinforced how we, as part of the AAHHE familia, have the corazón to facilitate change.    

One of the best experiences of my doctoral program was the opportunity to participate as an AAHHE Graduate Fellow. My mentor and dissertation committee chair, Doctora Nancy Acevedo-Gil, encouraged me to attend the 2017 AAHHE conference, where I connected with other Latina/o/x doctoral students and scholars in the field. It was at this conference where I learned of the graduate fellows program and decided that I needed to be a fellow. With Dra. Acevedo-Gil’s guidance and support, I applied and was accepted into the 2018 cohort.

Among a cohort of aspiring Latina/o/x leaders, I was humbled and inspired by the many accolades and sheer love that exuded from my cohort members. I am especially grateful for the leadership, enthusiasm and guidance of Øscar Medina (chair) and Ibette Valle (co-chair), Dra. Estee Hernandez (social media chair), Dr. Antonio Duran (social media co-chair), Dra. Molly Morin (alumni coordinator), and Dr. Andres Castro Samayoa (my faculty fellow mentor).

Aside from the many professional workshops and mentoring opportunities, being involved in the AAHHE fellowship created a space for me to reinforce my identities of Latina-scholar-practitioner and aspiring community college administrator. At AAHHE, I was empowered to embrace my goals and refine myself as a scholar of color. So much of our daily experiences in academia entails challenging notions of being the “other” (Said, 1979) and the blatant disregard for fostering “other ways of knowing” (Marquez Kiyama & Rios-Aguilar, 2018). Much emotional labor (Gonzales & Rincones, 2013) goes into transforming education inequities, and experiencing AAHHE as a graduate fellow refreshed my soul.       

The connections I made with scholars, faculty mentors, graduate fellows and with members of the AAHHE community assures me that we are part of the greater solution. In closing, Gloria Anzaldúa’s words embody the work we do as educators and where we are on the precipice of change in higher education transformation.

We are ready for change.

Let us link hands and hearts

together find a path through the dark woods

step through the doorways between worlds

leaving huellas for others to follow,

build bridges, cross them with grace, and claim these puentes our

“home”

si se puede, que asi sea, so be it, estamos listas, vamonos.

Now let us shift.

(Anzaldúa, 2002, p. 576)

Together, as AAHHE familia, we can make the changes necessary to cultivate a more equitable education system. •