On Tuesday, Oct. 4, Trinity’s Mexico, the Americas, and Spain (MAS) program hosted a panel of three Latina women called “Being Latina at Trinity University.” Students, faculty, staff and alumni gathered in the Holt Center as these women shared their stories.
In honor of Latinx Heritage Month, the MAS program has hosted events to educate students and give Latinx students opportunities to connect with their heritage. “Being Latina at Trinity University” was a panel designed to give Latina alumnae a space to recall their experiences at Trinity and current Latinx students, faculty, and staff the space to reflect on their own.
The panelists all had drastically different experiences at Trinity, with varying school years, areas of expertise, and majors. From the Caesar Chavez protests of the late 1970s to the challenges of first-generation students, the panelists explored how their identity intersected with their time at Trinity. Their stories highlighted how the University fell short in supporting them and ways the University can and has changed for the better. Meet these three incredible women.
Angela Miranda-Clark '89
Angela Miranda-Clark ’89 has worked at Trinity since 2019, where she is the compliance officer and Title IX coordinator. Since college, she has done many things. After law school, 9 years after her time at Trinity, she has worked as an attorney in varying fields, including Child Protective Services and discrimination cases.
Angela Miranda-Clark graduated from Trinity as a philosophy major with minors in Spanish and history. She then got her J.D. from the University of Texas Law School. During her time at Trinity as an undergraduate, Miranda-Clark became more aware of her Mexican heritage.
“Applying to college was the first time anyone asked me about my nationality,” she says. “When I came to Trinity, someone asked why I hadn't claimed my Mexican heritage before—no one had asked before.”
As an undergraduate, Miranda-Clark wishes she would have been braver and would have tried more things. “I’d tell [my college self] she is more capable and beautiful than she knows, and just about everyone has the same insecurities she does.”
She wishes there had been more support for first-generation students, including college and career advice. She believes universities like Trinity should “encourage and support Latinas in their academic and social lives and expose them to opportunities to learn about professions they might not know much about.”
Miranda-Clark sees Trinity trying to make changes to support Latinx students by “trying to be more conscious of diversity and trying to increase representation and visibility of minoritized groups. I see Trinity making a conscious and deliberate effort to address compensation discrepancies among employees.”
Sylvia Araiza '78
Born in westside San Antonio, Sylvia Araiza ’78 currently owns an accounting firm called Araiza & Associates, where she specializes in individual and small business tax returns.
Araiza remembers her time at Trinity as a culture clash. “There were people who had never seen or spoken to Brown people in their lives,” she says. “They had never seen a Latina, even here in San Antonio. ”
During her time in college, Araiza “was on the cusp of the Latino students being introduced into Trinity.” She took a break from her time at Trinity, wanting to “mature emotionally” before coming back because she felt that, at the time, the University “fell short in making everyone feel comfortable. They were trying their best to accommodate us, but it was very hard.”
Now, Araiza recognizes that “Trinity's student population is getting more diverse” and “becoming a more inclusive space.”
Araiza also says, “My time at Trinity awakened my roots. The experience allowed me to learn more of Latinx culture through language and customs.”
If she could say something to her college self, she would remind herself that “you are beautiful, gifted, talented, and blessed. It will get easier. It smooths out over time.”
Roxana Jaquelyn Rojas ’10
Roxana Jaquelyn Rojas’s work focuses on deportation and decoloniality as well as health disparities in the immigrant community. Recently, she worked as director of immigration and refugee services in Richmond, Virginia, where she helped develop programs designed to serve undocumented families and children. She graduated from Trinity in 2010 and received her master’s degree from the University of Texas at Austin, Lozano Long Institute for Latin American Studies.
During her time as a Trinity student, Rojas wishes she had more support, especially as a woman of color in the sciences and as a first-generation student.
Rojas ended up changing majors because of the lack of support as a woman in STEM. She advises that “if universities really want to be of service to a diverse student body,” they should “listen to [underrepresented] students, hear what their needs are, and lead with those students' needs, because if they are the priority, everyone will fare better. Also equally important is the hiring of faculty and staff that look like them—we need more Latinx professors who can also advocate for students and support them.”
She does see Trinity getting better in its hiring of Latinx professors and displaying Latino heritage and culture.
“I have seen many firsts with Trinity, which is a step forward,” she says. “I saw the first Latina to achieve full professor at Trinity, my dear mentor Rita Urquijo-Ruiz, and although I showed up to my graduation in a full-on Mexican outfit to represent my culture as I walked the stage, I know that now there's a De Colores ceremony, and colorful stoles are an option. However, though it’s a step forward it’s not nearly enough, we need to get past the 'firsts' and make representation the norm.”
“Oftentimes we are told to believe that decisions are made ‘higher-up’ as if that ‘higher-up’ were divine irrefutable power, but that's why change is stifled because, in reality, when there is a will, there is a way,” she says. “There has to be real willingness to do the work, and actions to show that.”
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