Ben Espinoza from Northeastern Seminary and Roberts Wesleyan University and I edited a book with Abilene Christian University Press about Hispanic faculty in Christian institutions. The book’s title is The Hispanic Faculty Experience: Opportunities for Growth and Retention in Christian Colleges and Universities. The book will be published on October 10th
This book provides the much-needed and unique opportunity for Hispanic faculty members in Christian institutions to share their experiences as professors in predominantly White institutions and encourage the next generation of Hispanic scholars coming through the ranks. The book will be especially useful for leaders in Christian higher education. The focus highlights the unique experiences and challenges of being Hispanic in Christian higher education. Our primary audience is faculty and administrators in CHE. In a way, our experiences in this book are a gift to our colleagues who are unaware of how difficult it is to navigate the professoriate as Hispanics.
I am grateful for the book’s wonderful endorsements we have received:
If you read one book this year, make it this one. Esqueda and Espinoza capture the joys, frustrations, triumphs, and disappointments, of professors who are heroes. Christian higher education is only excellent when the faculty who serve students looks like the students Christian universities are committed to admitting and graduating. Presidents, provosts, deans, and college trustees will find The Hispanic Faculty Experience a treasure. Read it today.
— Shirley V. Hoogstra, president, Council for Christian Colleges & Universities
“This book is the first to focus exclusively on the Hispanic faculty experience. I trust these voices to shepherd Christian colleges and universities into the increasingly diverse and hopeful future which God has in store.”
—Robert Chao Romero, associate professor, Chavez Department of Chicana/o and Central American Studies; Asian American Studies, UCLA and author of Brown Church: Five Centuries of Latina/o Social Justice, Theology, and Identity
“Here is an essential work for all those ministering in Christian higher education to hear the voices of Hispanic professors in shaping our shared future. Scholars Esqueda and Espinoza have insightfully crafted and orchestrated a volume that invites broad discussion and prophetic planning addressing past inequities.”
—Robert W. Pazmiño, Valeria Stone Professor of Christian Education, emeritus, Andover Newton Seminary at Yale Divinity School
“Latiné persons are ubiquitous in North American society, including Christian higher education, yet rarely seen for who they really are nor acknowledged for their contributions to their school’s mission. Mirroring the diversity of Latiné in the USA, this collection of stories allows all readers to truly understand their Hispanic colleagues’ doubts, frustrations, commitments, and dreams. A must-read for senior administrators seeking to increase the number of students, faculty, and staff among their ranks.”
—Alvin Padilla, professor of New Testament, dean, Latino and Global Ministries at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary
“This anthology brings a seasoned, informed, and thoughtful group of Latina/o scholars and educators to share eloquently about their joys and pains, their struggles and achievements, and their sacrifices and victories in following a personal and Christian vocation in predominantly white schools within the orbit of Christian Colleges and Universities. This reading is for conversation, reflection, and action directed to doctoral students, professors, administrators, staff, and members of the board of directors. Kudos and felicitaciones to the authors and editors for this contribution.”
—Luis R. Rivera-Rodríguez, vice president of the Hispanic Association for Theological Education
“Latine people as well as non Latine people will gather wisdom, grace, and love from the offering of the gifts of these lives. The gift brings forth transformation. Most of all, the depth of spirituality that these stories offer prepare us to be made into the imago Dei as teachers and scholars who in turn nurture the lives of others. Read only if you are ready.”
—Elizabeth Conde-Frazier, director, Association for Hispanic Theological Education
“It is incumbent upon White culture to remember Hispanics not as a current trend in new enrollments but as a population overlooked and underserved for decades. The authors challenge us to mentor the next generation of young faculty, especially those from minority backgrounds, toward success, an opportunity too important to ignore. The Hispanic Faculty Experience is a must-read for presidents, deans, and faculty who wish to develop faculty leaders among all God’s people.”
—James R. Moore, director of accreditation, Association of Theological Schools
“Christian Colleges and Universities struggle to give Hispanic leaders a significant voice in their institutions. Drs. Esqueda and Espinoza provide faculty and administrators with a clearer understanding of the Hispanic leaders’ narrative and how that narrative is to be heard in the border context.”
—Mark Maddix, dean, School of Theology and Christian Ministry, Point Loma Nazarene University
“Timely. Necessary. Affirming. Through the powerful use of stories, each essay in this volume creates a window to the various and often overlooked experiences of Latina/o faculty in Christian higher education. The Hispanic Faculty Experience is a critical resource for understanding the Latina/o faculty experience in the United States. Certainly, a must-read for Christian higher education administrators seeking to work towards increasing Latina/o faculty representation as they face the inevitable growth in the Latina/o student enrollment across the nation.”
— Norlan Hernández, director, Jesse Miranda Center, Vanguard University
“The Hispanic Faculty Experience is full of tears, frustrations, joys, and sincere moments of vocational questioning. Hispanics are and will be by the mid-twenty-first century, the unstoppable social phenomenon that will swell the waves of students that will sustain higher education. These professors testify, “estaba dura la cosa” (it was tough). All authors are “valientes” (courageous) and an example of a faithful “testimonio” (testimony) that the Holy Spirit sustains in each step of the journey.”
—Oscar Merlo, director, Center for the Study of the Work and Ministry of the Holy Spirit Today, Biola University
“This book is especially valuable to executive leadership in education, who are invested and committed to diversity, inclusive, and equity and are making them an integral component of their educational culture. The educational life journeys of the scholar’s stories represented in The Hispanic Faculty Experience will help the reader see many blind spots in our educational systems, and in cultural understandings. It also provides hopeful models for mentoring and educating students from different ethnicities. A must read for forward thinking scholars/leaders!”
—Joanne Rodríguez, executive director Hispanic Theological Initiative