Introducing Mintzi Martinez-Rivera: Our New Latinx Faculty

Qué Pasa, OSU Editor 23′-24′

By Irma J. Zamora Fuerte, OhD Candidate, English

Dr. Mintzi Martinez-Ramirez

Irma Zamora: How are you building community? Where’s that intersection between community and your work as a new faculty member?

Mintzi Martinez-Rivera: My process is to arrive in a new place and see what’s there, then see what I can support and how to contribute. Right now, I’m still seeing how I can contribute.

One important thing is working with students and supporting their projects as much as I can. When I was in Indiana, I supported one of the Latinx fraternities in their partnership with Hispanic and minority-serving schools, doing field trips during weekends to inspire students to apply for college. I also hosted a mock class for high school students where they asked me what type of labor they needed from me. Here, I hope to start developing that relationship with organizations and see how I can be of service.

IZ: How are you setting yourself up to prevent burnout? How much of a factor is that there’s a larger cohort of new Latinx faculty and that some have worked on establishing things for students here?

MMR: I mean, there can still be more… but having a cohort means we can divide the load and support each other. That’s one aspect that’s very important and key to success: solidarity and support. And by support, not just at the institutional level but also at the community grassroots level.

“Supporting each other on a day-to-day basis is crucial for faculty and students of color to be successful in spaces that aren’t designed for us. This is one of the beautiful things about being in a Latinx studies environment.”

In it, we can think and use the mechanisms, tools, and knowledge from our own communities to build that into this system and help each other: grad students, faculty, employees, and undergrad students. What is more, to think of ourselves as a network instead of as separate groups. If students are healthy as much as possible, then, that also helps faculty and vice versa.

Another helpful part is having senior faculty helping and protecting my time and ensuring that I’m not overburdened. It’s this whole system where we have people helping us and protecting us. Here, I’m seeing some senior colleagues… trying to protect the incoming new faculty.

I remember that when I started grad school, there weren’t conversations about physical/ mental health among grad students. If you were sick, you’d have to hide it. You didn’t want your colleagues or other grad students or faculty members to know because you’d be labeled as weak.

I’m happy that we’re having conversations about physical and mental health for grad students and faculty. We need to continue visibilizing this and creating mechanisms to keep us happy, healthy, and living. What’s been key for me was creating boundaries in terms of protecting my time. I’m protecting my space, the things that I love and that are important to me, those things that are key to my well-being. It’s a balancing act, and it takes time.

Moreover, faculty of color tend to have the highest number of students, and that affects their productivity. They cannot dedicate time to writing and research because they’re doing all this level of mentorship, which is incredibly important. And these friends, they’re amazing, brilliant, and really kind, but they have an enormous number of students… and unfortunately, that labor isn’t necessarily recognized.

IZ: What’s important about having faculty of color coming? How do we go about co-creating our future together?

MMR: One thing is representation. Having faculty of color is important for the well-being of students. For example, I talked with a student today who told me, “Professor, I’m so happy that I’m taking an Intro to Latinx Studies class.” I’ve also had students tell me, “Professor, you’re the first Latina I’ve taken classes with in college.”

My intro class is more than half students of color, and that’s important for their white peers as they see a classroom where they’re the minority. That’s powerful; having different voices and different experiences inside the classroom.

Another part is that what I’m teaching and reading is my family story. And that’s a very different understanding of educational experience, knowledge, and all those different things where we can go on. My classroom is coming in directly from very much a Latinx perspective, so we are co-creating the class, not from a white Eurocentric perspective. Doing that is rich and different for students.