I must admit that teaching in an academic setting is a relatively new found love for me. I did not start my PhD program thinking I would be a professor. It was not until I began to work as a teaching assistant that I started to truly understand how “cool” it is to contribute to the education of future public health practitioners, researchers and professors. “Cool” especially summarizes the feeling I have when, for instance, I find myself leading an entire 3-hour lecture on health policy and health equity to an engaged classroom of 70 students. On the one hand, I am pleased and surprised with myself for having the content to facilitate 3-hour classes, because I cannot pinpoint when I crossed the threshold of being a relatively quiet student to being an enthusiastic “professor-in-training”. On the other hand, teaching to a classroom of over 70 students who are engaged throughout the lecture has been one of the most fulfilling experiences I have had while in the PhD program. I have received positive feedback from students (average 4.5 over 5) on my lectures and work as a teaching assistant. I can safely say that this positive student feedback is among the most validating compliments I have received in a professional setting.
I have taken this component of my early academic career very seriously. I have one rule for myself: I am not in the classroom to impose my beliefs, biases, or opinions. I am there to share facts on various health policy topics and allow students to arrive at their own conclusions based on their own political philosophies and positions. I only ask and emphasize that they base their conclusions on evidence.
All of the courses for which I have been a teaching assistant and lectured focused on health policy, health equity, management and budgeting. I know that I have the experience and knowledge to lead an entire course at the master level in these areas. As a result of my development as an educator and my research experience with behavioral health integration policy, I have been invited to lead one of the core required courses for the MPH in Population Mental Health & Wellbeing at the Colorado School of Public Health (Mental Health Systems and Policy).
In the context of teaching at the master level, I believe we are in very unique times in terms of our political environment. Especially when the course material is so intimately connected to politics and its dynamics such as health policy, reform, and equity. In and out of the classroom I strive to provide an environment where students can intelligently and respectfully discuss topics which may elicit diverging opinions and experiences. In fact, I strongly encourage students who may feel they have the “minority” opinion to discuss their ideas in class. I think that facilitating this type of debate and discussion is at the heart of effective teaching and learning. It potentially exposes students to new ideas and perspectives which gradually allows them to integrate (or not) divergent ideas from their own, ultimately leading to newly formed perspectives. I am also committed to teaching skills that transcend public health and health policy, such as consensus building, fact-based debating, and compromising.
Commitment to inclusion and diversity have always been top of mind for me. From an academic and professional perspective, my success is also the product of the opportunities I have been given because I have been in environments that nurtured and committed to inclusion and diversity. Not only from an institutional policy or requirement perspective, but from the less formal perspective. At critical times in my life I have come across key individuals that recognized my value and gave me opportunities to grow despite my background as a Latin American Woman. In fact, some of the value lied precisely in what I could bring to the team or work at hand by drawing from my diverse background and experience. Based on my experience, I know that inclusion and diversity must be deliberately integrated in institutional policy, and more importantly, at the individual level. I want to help facilitate the success of others, like myself, who may experience greater barriers to opportunities for various reasons that are not limited to race or ethnicity.
I have been working with a group of youth since 2002 who are now young productive adults. This work started as part of an immigrant youth program at one of the non-profits I worked for many years. Some of them (or their parents) were undocumented and experienced many of the issues usually associated with being an immigrant. Our work (my mother, sister, I) with the youth covered many areas of public speaking, civic engagement, community work, self-esteem building, and many other activities that sought to encourage the youth to see themselves as productive members of society. In fact, many of these youth were among the first “Dreamers” and gave testimonials on “Dreamers” rights to legislators at the Massachusetts State House and Washington, DC. All under our guidance, but solely based on their skills and resiliency. Much of this work culminated into the first Brazil Week at Harvard University in which the youth exhibited photographs they had taken to depict their experience as immigrants. I have kept in contact with the majority of these youth and have given them mentorship over the years especially as it relates to their careers and education.
I will bring the same level of commitment to student and mentee development that I have provided to the youth mentioned above, and from which I have benefitted. The university context is different; however, the same underlying motivation that kept me engaged with the youth in the non-profit is what I will draw from in this next phase in my academic career.