About us
Mission Statement
The Center for Mexican American Studies (CMAS) at the University of Houston was established in 1972 as an interdisciplinary academic program encompassing the liberal arts, education, and social sciences focusing on the Mexican American and broader Latino experience in the U.S. Its mission is to advance knowledge, promote critical thinking and foster the value of service to the community. This involves designing a broad spectrum of public and scholarly programs. Located within the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences, CMAS has evolved into an academic unit with several major components: teaching, research and publications, recruitment and retention, leadership training, academic advising, and community service.
Current Newsletter
Noticias
Volume 6 Issue 2 - Spring 2009
From the Director
In this edition we feature three of our students from the Academic Achievers Program (AAP) at Austin High School. The students are members of the fourth AAP cohort that CMAS has sponsored, beginning in 1998. CMAS selects students for a cohort as they enter the tenth grade. We work with them for the remainder of their time at Austin, providing them with mentoring, tutoring, and skills workshops with the intent of preparing for their admission to college, preferably at the University of Houston. If the students adhere to our require-ments and gain admission to the University of Houston, they are then eligible for membership in the Academic Achievers Program-UH and a four-year $10,000 scholarship. Once a cohort graduates from Austin, CMAS selects another cohort and the process starts again. To date, 194 Austin students have participated in the program, and 192 have graduated with 138 gaining admission to the University of Houston and 37 attending other insti-tutions of higher education.
Felipe Benitez is a student, who at a very young age had to overcome serious behavioral issues and familial adversity. His older brother was a victim of violence who almost died from a broken neck. A few weeks later Felipe’s mother was diagnosed with cancer. She passed two years after being diagnosed leaving Felipe, his father, and three siblings to deal with the aftermath. At the time, Felipe was ten years old. Felipe is now aspiring to enter the University of Houston and earn a degree in computer technology.
Maria Guadalupe Lugo is one of five children of a single-parent household. Her mother has struggled to provide for her children, and she always stressed education as the way to have a better opportunity in life. Maria says that she did not get serious about attending college until she joined the Academic Achievers Program. She says that she is proud of her brother and sister for going to college part-time, but that watching them grapple to raise a family and simultaneously go to school has influenced her to delay marriage and starting a family until she has earned her college degree.
Marc Anthony Martinez is an only child in an extended family of very few high school graduates, and even fewer college graduates. He says that when he was growing up he cared very little about grades. Things began to turn around for him in the fifth grade when he received some negative feed-back from his family. He changed schools and started working hard to earn good grades. He credits his father and the AAP for giving him direction. He now aspires to major in Marketing with a minor in Media Production.
In this issue we also feature Jacob M. Monty, the fourth Latino to serve on the University of Houston Board of Regents. His story is one of determination as evidenced by his finishing his undergraduate schooling in less than two years. He went on to earn a law degree from the University of Houston, and is now a successful attorney with his own law firm focusing on employment and immigration law. He was appointed to the University of Houston Board of Regents in 2008 by Governor Rick Perry.
Also in this issue are articles about two Latino faculty members. Adriana Alcantara is a psychologist who earned her Ph.D. in Biological Psychology from the University of Illinois. Her specialization is biopsychology, the study of how the functions of the brain influence behavior. She is especially interested in the part of the brain that influences addictive behavior.
Estevan Azcona is the CMAS Visiting Scholar for the 2008-09 academic year. He earned his Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology from the University of Texas at Austin in 2008. He specializes in Mexican and Latin American music and culture, with a particular interest in the music of social movements. He is also a musician and plays the bass, the guitarrón, and the jarana. He is one of only five Mexican American ethnomusicologists in the United States.
Also, featured in this issue are two new CMAS employees: Ruben Morales and Yolanda Arreguin. Ruben Morales is the Special Program Counselor who oversees the AAP at Austin High School. Yolanda Arreguin is a Program Coordinator for the AAP at the University of Houston. We welcome Ruben and Yolanda to the CMAS family. We are proud of their accomplishments. We also take great pride in honoring the other talented and hard-working Latino faculty and students, and our own inspiring Latino Regent, Jacob M. Monty, who are featured in this newsletter.