The History of Our Victory / 8th Annual Statewide Summit on MAS

Nuestra Palabra: Latino Writers Have Their Say

Tony Diaz, El Librotraficante, speaks w/ participants at the summit and the continued efforts to recognize efforts to further integrate ethnic studies into our schools. Tony discusses new approaches including recent initiatives such as developing new curriculums from new books from Latino authors.

Dr. Christopher Carmona is an award-winning author and a member of the award-winning Refusing to Forget project. His novel, El Rinche: The Ghost Ranger of the Rio Grande, was a finalist for the 2019 Best Young Adult Novel for the Texas Institute of Letters. Currently, he is working on finishing this series of YA novels. Book Two is out now. His short story collection, The Road to Llorona Park, won the 2016 NACCS Tejas Best Fiction Award and was listed as one of the top 8 Latinx books in 2016 by NBCNews. He served as the Chair of the NACCS Tejas Foco Committee on Implementing MAS in PreK-12 Education in Texas. He was a leader in getting the TEKS based Mexican American Studies High School Course approved by the Texas State Board of Education. He served on Responsible Ethnic Studies Textbook committee that was awarded the “float like a butterfly, sting like a bee” award for excellence in educational leadership from the Mexican American School Board Association (MASBA). He is also an inductee to the Texas Institute of Letters.

Dr. Valerie A. Martínez specializes in 20th Century Mexican American history, U.S. Military and Labor History, and Women’s and Gender Studies and a core member of the Ethnic Studies Network of Texas, and the chair of the National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies Tejas-Foco pre-K – 12 Committee. Dr. Martínez is currently an Assistant Professor of History and History Program Head at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio, Texas. Her current National Endowment for the Humanities-funded project, Embajadoras: Latina Servicewomen and Hemispheric Politics during World War II, reconceptualized traditional notions of diplomacy and international actors by investigating how the recruitment and service of Latina women in the Benito Juárez Squadron during World War II embodied the Pan-American ideal of an imagined hemispheric system of unity and reciprocity in the Americas. Her transnational research in both Mexico and the US has been funded by several entities. She is also the co-recipient of an NEH grant to create an oral history project dedicated to women veterans, a core member of the Ethnic Studies Network of Texas, and the chair of the National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies Tejas-Foco pre-K – 12 Committee. Dr. Martínez is currently an Assistant Professor of History and History Program Head at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio, Texas.

Araceli Manriquez is a middle school dual-language teacher in San Antonio ISD. She currently teaches eighth-grade DL social studies and started the first Mexican American Studies (MAS) course for middle school students in the district. She received her double-major bachelor’s degree in Interdisciplinary Studies Bilingual EC-6 and Mexican American Studies from the University of Texas at San Antonio and also has her master’s degree in Bilingual-Bicultural Studies. Manriquez has been at the forefront of advocacy and organizing for Mexican American Studies to be offered as a course for credit throughout the state of Texas.
She also helped create a MAS Summer Camp on her campus for San Antonio ISD middle and high school students and writes MAS curriculum for the district. Manriquez is an active member of her local union, the San Antonio Alliance, and a founding member of its social justice caucus, PODER. She leads professional development in social studies, Mexican-American studies and culturally relevant/sustaining pedagogy for educators throughout San Antonio.

Instrumental Music produced / courtesy of Bayden Records
Website | baydenrecords.beatstars.com