La Lucha Sigue: Latinas in Upper Level Academic Administration

• In Event: Interventions Influencing Student Sucess
  In Roundtable Session: Leadership Journeys in Higher Education

Abstract

The following paper seeks to understand the experience of Latinas in upper level academic leadership roles at four-year public institutions.  Due to Latinas strong connection to their culture and gender (Blea, 1992)particular focus will be placed on these two characteristics.  Despite an increasingly diverse student population, university administration continues to be a largely homogenous group.  Cook (2012) reports that between 2006 and 2011, the number of women presidents increased from 26.4% to 29.4% within all public education institutions.  However, these numbers decrease when the data is disaggregated by ethnicity.  Furthermore, these figures only reflect those in the presidency level, it does not discuss other upper level academic positions such as Vice Presidents, Associate Vice Presidents and others who also play a role on campus policies, practices and procedures.  
Latina’s identity is composed of various characteristics and Chicana feminist thought (Anzaldua, 1998) recognizes these various components.  This framework allows for challenges women of color undergo due to their various characteristics but also acknowledges the strengths connected to them.  Due to the purpose of this paper, the unit of analysis, and the framework, the method utilized must be one that allows people’s words to be the source of data. Qualitative research has as a main goal to uncover and interpret how people understand and experience their world (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016).  Additionally, due to the limited literature on Latina senior academic administrators, a qualitative approach will provide a venue for these women to make meaning of their unique experiences (Plano Clark & Creswell, 2010).
Under the qualitative approach and connected to Chicana feminist theory, testimonios,  provides a design that is collaborative and attentive to the numerous ways of knowing and learning in the Latina/o communities (Delgado Bernal, D. Burciaga, R. and Carmona, J., 2012).  Testimonios has its roots in the Latin American social political struggles (Blackmer Reyes and Curry Rodriguez, 2012) and was used in the education field to address the educational inequities encountered by Chicana/os (Delgado Berna, Burciaga, and Carmona, 2012, Perez-Huber 2008).  Testimonios allows the participants to be part of the creation of knowledge, constructs solidarity between participants, researcher and readers, and calls for social justice.  Participants are recruited through social media, academic and professional list serves.  After the interview the participants are requested to participate in a focus group to help with data analysis.
This paper will add to the limited literature on Latinas in upper level academic administrative posts in higher education contexts. As the number of Latinas entering graduate studies in the education field continues to increase  there is a need to understand how those who hold seniorleadership roles managed their culture and gender in order to assist future leaders.  This paper will be able to provide insight that can change practices regarding new administrators at four-year universities.  

Author

• Eliza Hoyos Vences, Los Angeles Trade Technical College