Meet Dr. Ruben Mendoza - Ph.D. Project Graduate Integrating His Latino Culture into the Classroom
As we continue to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month, we share the story of Ruben Mendoza today. He immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager, and now holds a PhD after being a part of The PhD Project. He is serving as an educator and it is clear his mission is centered on broadening student perspectives and supporting all learners in the classroom. It is our honor to introduce Dr. Ruben Mendoza!
What is your personal narrative? What key moments in your life led you to where you are?
I immigrated to New York City in my early teens and had to learn English in High School. After college, I worked for a reputable multinational company for several years and thought I had accomplished my life’s goal. I was excited and grateful. After 5-6 years I started feeling restless and dissatisfied, and felt my path lay elsewhere but didn’t know where.
I called the local university asking to speak with the dean, and Dr. Ralph Katerberg graciously hosted me for a couple of hours, introduced me to faculty, and told me about The PhD Project. I applied and attended the annual conference. I have never known such a rollercoaster of emotions in such a short period of time. I attended all sessions and went from completely discounting my place as a business professor to total rapture about becoming one, and back, several times during the conference. At the end of the conference my mind was made up and I began to make preparations large and small (selling my car, taking grad school exams, proposing to and marrying my girlfriend, who remains my wife) to begin my PhD program. The road was anything but smooth, and “sweat, blood, and tears” is not far off the mark. I do not remember much (at all!) of my five-hour drive home after my dissertation defense beyond being on the phone the entire time with family and friends.
The day of my graduation, I still felt like something was going to happen and I would be pulled aside and told there had been a mistake. When I arrived to the assembly area and was given my own name card, plus one with the name of the business school as the first graduate in the line, I nearly lost it. I called my wife, who was in attendance with our six-year-old daughter and several other family members, and yelled incredulously into the phone: “They are going to call me! They are going to call my name!” Crossing the actual stage was almost anticlimactic compared to that moment. I still get a little rush thinking of that moment.
There have been many other bumps along the road since, but these have probably been the key ones.
How has your identity as a part of the "cultura Latina" impacted your life? How do you stay connected to this in the work that you do?
While working on my PhD, I kept hearing these dismal numbers about representation as a Hispanic faculty member. They have improved, but are still far from representative of the country’s population. I remain keenly aware of this.
My university is making wonderful strides toward representative percentages, but when I first arrived our campus was not very diverse. I decided early on in my career that becoming a model of what Hispanic/Latino(a) professionals are and can be to non-minority students was an important part of the mission, my mission, and I work to bring elements of my background and culture into my classroom continually. Sometimes it is in the selection of a case study or article focusing on Latin America, sometimes by playing some Latin music between classes or during self-directed work. If an opportunity to educate my students this way presents itself, I take it. We’ll discuss accents throughout Latin America (they are not the same!), vocabulary (also not the same!), food (wait for it…), traditions, etc. They may not have a lot to do with the material, but they have everything to do with a (potential) reshaping of perceptions and/or of pride in representation. All our students need to be seen and heard, and my hope is that, through me, they see and hear.
In what ways do you continue to promote equity and inclusion of the Latino/a community? How can others join you in being more inclusive?
I am the Academic Advisor for several student organizations and honor societies, including a student chapter of a business organization for Hispanic/Latino(a) professionals (ALPFA). In all of them, as well as in my classrooms, I maintain consistent expectations for performance and professionalism for all students. This is all anyone is looking for: a level playing field.
I serve the equity and inclusion mission by providing opportunities for Hispanic/Latino(a) students which they may otherwise not be aware of, or would not be exposed to. An important element for my work with student organizations is that they remain open to membership by any student who is interested in learning about who and what the organization represents. You can’t only preach to the choir!
What advice would you give to future Inclusive Inspirational Leaders?
The work of increasing diversity moves along a very long axis, and patience is an absolute requirement. Our young students come to us still seeking their place in their own world, and many of them carry the weight of expectations with them. These expectations can be of either high or low achievement and performance, and of being representatives to a wide spectrum of backgrounds making up the Hispanic/Latino(a) experience, which is simply not possible to do: we don’t sound the same, we don’t eat the same, etc.
They also experience assimilation pressure for all the cultures they may claim for themselves, or which may be trying to claim them. It is not our job to tell them who they are, only to help them be who they could be.
I have always felt cultural behavioral patterns are like an all-you-can-eat buffet, and you are allowed to pick and choose what you want on your plate. We should model respect for what is on other plates as well.
GlobalMindED is proud to have The PhD Project and all of their extraordinary faculty as part of our Inclusive Success Network. Please watch the 2022 conference recap
to see this collaboration and action.
