Entering College? Latino Professors Share Some Great Advice
*This goes out to all you Taquistas who have a daughter or son going to college, or know of someone who has kids starting college. Good advice here from Latino college profs. VL
By Stephen A. Nuño, NBC News
Entering the halls of academia will be a daunting experience for every freshman walking into a college classroom for the first time as the new school year approaches. As a professor I have grown used to the many faces of uncertainty on the first day of class. Some students cloak this in boisterous overconfidence, some in silence, but with most students you can sense their eyeballs follow you as you walk into the room on that first day with caution and curiosity. In short, it’s a fun day for those of us in front of the class, too.
[pullquote]Get an internship; get to know as many people as you can; travel; take yourself seriously, develope good writing skills; remember, you belong.[/pullquote]Perhaps the greatest privilege as a Latino professor is knowing other Latino/as who managed to succeed and reach the highest pinnacles of academia. Many were kind enough to send me their thoughts, and I post them below. But before you read them, I leave you with some thoughts and practical advice I give to all my freshman students.
Latino students will surely face the same problems all students face; such as time management, social pressure, and the ubiquitous presence of the byzantine bureaucracies you will need to master. But for Latino students, the barriers are many, and the pitfalls can be found everywhere. Even though more Latinos are enrolling into college in greater numbers than ever before, the “pipeline” is still fraught with unique problems for many Hispanic students.
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[Photo by Francisco Osorio/Flickr]
