ExchangeAlumni Dalareich Polot is reveling in sweet success after being named recipient of the 2022 Goldman Sachs/Fortune Most Powerful Women Global Award. This annual award recognizes outstanding individuals who have completed the Fortune-US Department of State Global Women’s Mentoring Partnership and the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women Initiative, which Dalareich completed in 2011.
Dalareich, a native Filipina, is the founder of Ginto Fine Chocolates, a boutique chocolate shop that produces artisanal chocolate products and supports cacao farmers in Bohol – an island province famously known for its cacao farms, dubbed “Chocolate Hills.”
Through Ginto, Dalareich empowers cacao farmers throughout the country by promoting sustainable farming practices and by educating them about cacao trees. By creating farming communities in the region, Dalareich empowers local farmers to rehabilitate old cacao trees, rather than simply cutting them down.
Her love for chocolate can be traced back to her early childhood, when her mother would make and sell an unsweetened chocolate that could be turned into a beverage called “tableya” to bring in extra income to their household.
Dalareich remembers helping her mother make tableya in their kitchen and then selling it throughout their neighborhood – including to her teachers to help pay her and her four siblings’ way through school. What started as a small family business turned into a growing enterprise after Dalareich graduated from Bohol State University in 2009, and continued after she completed the Goldman Sachs Program at the University of Asia and the Pacific in 2011.
In 2014, Dalareich found her way back to the Philippines, joining a pitch competition called the Young Women Entrepreneurs Bootcamp with SPARK!, hosted by the U.S. Embassy Manila. After receiving a scholarship to study the science behind cacao and chocolate production in the Cacao Lab at Ghent University, Dalareich applied lessons she had learned here to found Ginto Fine Chocolates, which focuses on bean-bar production in Bohol.
In 2016, Dalareich was invited to participate in the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP), funded by the U.S. Department of State, which was focused around the theme of “Fostering Growth And Promoting Women Entrepreneurship for the Philippines.”
Dalareich says her IVLP experience equipped her with a new set of skills to start and grow her chocolate business, while also providing her with a network of like-minded female entrepreneurs.
“The program influenced me a lot, and it inspired me to work better in our business and my advocacies. I learned to lead, inspire, and empower more people – especially the young women around me,” she said.
As the youngest participant in her program, Dalareich was inspired by the other female participants, one of whom was
Filippina Mayor, Junaflor "Sweet" Cerilles. After the program ended, Dalareich traveled to the mayor’s region of Dumalinao to speak on the importance of sustainable farming practices.
As Dalareich continues to grow Ginto Chocolates, she’s also involved in the Academy for Women Entrepreneurs (AWE) Program with the U.S. Embassy in the Philippines to help empower female entrepreneurs to start and run their own businesses throughout the country.
“I want to empower more women, like my mom did for me, and make them realize that they can have more opportunities despite all the barriers and challenges they are facing today,” Dalareich said.
Congratulations on your sweet success, Dalareich!
When Marvel first approached award-winning Pakistani illustrator and designer Shehzil Malik about contributing artwork to its latest series, Ms. Marvel, Shehzil thought the message might be spam. But it was no joke – Marvel wanted to use some of Shehzil’s artworks in the show to represent Kamala Khan’s heritage as the first Muslim/Pakistani-American superhero.
On Wednesday, November 16 at 9:00 a.m. ET, find out the story behind Shehzil’s journey into the Marvel universe, how she uses illustration to inspire social change in her home country, and why more creators should take a chance and apply for a Fulbright Scholarship.
In this MentorTalks episode, you’ll also hear what inspired Shehzil to become interested in art as a way to tell a story and why she believes South Asians need to tell stories from their own perspectives.
“I think the more personal you can get, the more universal your story can be,” she says.
Tune in November 16 on Facebook, LinkedIn, or YouTube!
Speaker Bio (via Shehzil’s website, courtesy Shehzil Malik)
Shehzil Malik is a designer and illustrator with a focus on human rights, feminism and South Asian identity. She leads a studio that works on social impact projects through digital art, publications, textile and public art. Her work has been featured in CNN, DW, BBC and Forbes with clients including Sony Music, Penguin Random House, Oxfam, New York Times, GIZ and Google.
She is a Fulbright scholar with an MFA in Visual Communication Design from the Rochester Institute of Technology and is part of the International Development Innovation Network (IDIN). She was a contributing artist and panelist at the Oslo Freedom Forum 2019 and has previously worked as an art director at Ogilvy & Mather, Lahore.
Being a college student during the height of the coronavirus pandemic wasn’t easy for anyone. That time of uncertainty pushed Liz, a business student at the University of Michigan, to look for an opportunity to try something new.
Business & Culture: A Virtual Practicum, implemented by the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan (WDI), seemed like a fun and different learning experience, so she decided to go for it. “I took the program to just learn new perspectives and kind of challenge my own way of thinking. Something that's been really important to me is trying to maintain that lifelong learning mindset [from] a cultural view as opposed to just learning from textbooks and professors.”
Liz wanted to make the most of the four years as an undergraduate student, but she wasn’t interested in studying abroad and preferred to stay put on campus. This virtual exchange was perfect for her because it allowed her to interact with peers in Egypt, Lebanon, and Libya without ever leaving Ann Arbor. Liz and her international partners worked on a project together through virtual meetings, while also getting to know each other on a personal level and building those relationships.
As much as Liz enjoyed collaborating with her peers on their coursework, she values the more casual conversations they had about their lives and university life in general. “One of my favorite memories was my group exchanging recipes from all of our different cultures that we really liked. That was something that was easy to do online, we just set up an email chain. I would say [virtual exchange] is a really easy way just to see what other cultures and other students are doing across the world.” As an avid baker, she shared a chocolate chip cookie recipe with her group of friends and even tried out a Lebanese dish. This activity allowed them to connect more with one another and share parts of themselves with the group.
Because this was a business-focused exchange, she learned a lot about how to conduct business on a global scale. Perhaps her biggest lesson was that, even though people with different backgrounds and cultures may do things differently, one isn’t better than the other. “Even at the University of Michigan, I had a lot of international friends and even people from different parts of the state of Michigan that have just a different way of doing things, and so I think it really taught me that my way isn't the right way. I think that was something I really tried to bring into practice.”
Their small group’s approach to intercultural communication was something that Liz appreciated. They all went into the experience with an open mind and with the willingness to learn. “We all were very cognizant of challenging stereotypes and [saying] ‘I want to actually get to know you as an individual, not you as an American.’ I think that was really interesting and being with your peers is a much easier way to challenge each other, because we're all students trying to learn.” Having the chance to engage with culturally diverse peers was valuable in so many ways, but especially before Liz and her peers entered the professional space, where the stakes are higher and cultural miscommunications can negatively impact their professional experiences.
For Liz, this course stood out among the rest. It offered a unique opportunity to take a step into the world of international business. She believes more students should take the course and challenge themselves. “I convinced, I think, four of my friends to take it whenever they were offering it next. Even though the class is at 8:30am, which is a tough time for college students, [I told them] ‘I promise you it's worth it to get up early for this class.’ At the end of the day, I really loved my experience, and I think it's been one of my favorite college classes that I've taken.”
After graduating in spring 2022, Liz spent the summer in Boston interning with Deloitte. She returned to the University of Michigan this fall to begin a master’s program in Accounting. After receiving her masters degree, Liz has plans to return to Deloitte in their New York City office where she will continue to foster her lifelong learning mindset. The skills and lessons she learned during the virtual exchange have prepared her well for future opportunities, enabling her to develop and grow professionally.
Business & Culture: A Virtual Practicum, implemented by the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan (WDI), is supported by the Stevens Initiative, which is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, with funding provided by the U.S. Government, and is administered by the Aspen Institute. The Stevens Initiative is also supported by the Bezos Family Foundation and the governments of Morocco and the United Arab Emirates.
Rama, a high school student in Jordan, participated in GNG’s Student to World, which offered her in-depth insight into current global topics and led to changes in her perspective, growth, and development. Rama is a naturally curious person with many passions. The topic of her first virtual exchange was Overcoming Bias, and she was intrigued by an activity meant to help participants visualize the diversity in their personal lives. Centered around subconscious bias and racial diversity, this activity prompted Rama's curiosity to continue engaging in the program. Rama says this was “an opportunity to do the hard thing and develop personal relationships with people from different races and learn about their culture directly from them.”
After such a positive experience with the Overcoming Bias course, Rama continued to enroll in other Student to World courses focused on a variety of subjects. She participated in a module on Multiple Intelligence and recalls a powerful moment where she was confronted with redefining what it means to be intelligent. As someone who enjoys writing and has a talent for it, she never thought that it was something that she should be proud of. Taking this course at such an impressionable age allowed her to think about intelligence beyond just grades in school. She realized that her writing skills were a form of intelligence and something she should celebrate, grow, and sharpen.
She describes a memorable experience with a peer during a class session discussing women's rights. It was a learning experience for Rama to hear the perspective of a male classmate who had opposing views to her own. He then shared that his opinions had changed throughout the course and that he was now proud to say that he was a feminist. “I was very moved by that... most people when they have a false idea on a certain topic and are presented with facts [struggle] to face that ‘Oh, I might have been wrong in this matter’”. Listening to her classmate share his story of development and growth was impressive and she felt inspired by his honesty. For Rama, this reinforced the need for self-reflection and taking extra time to understand others; their mindset, opinions, and perspectives, especially if they are different from your own.
After completing several virtual exchange courses at GNG, Rama applied for GNG’s Alumni Internship program and was selected to participate. The internship was designed to provide alumni an opportunity to be involved in curriculum development and digital interface design. This was a chance for Rama to work on a cross-regional team and continue learning and exploring different topics of interest to her, like social media marketing. She picked up on hard skills like data analyzing and gained experience thinking through issues and coming up with solutions. “There's like a whole list of skills that I gained from [the internship]...I remember doing my first task in which we had to search for social media pages that are similar and analyze why people are attracted to them and I found a common pattern of people being attracted to graphic design and themes. It helped me see data from a three dimensional perspective.” She also volunteered her time to plan a closing ceremony for the program and ran a successful event.
When it comes to the future, Rama does not know which career path she will take, but surely she aspires to find a career in which all of her passions are fulfilled. As she heads into the last two years of high school, she hopes to continue exploring virtual and in-person opportunities that will nurture her many interests and set her up for even more success.
Student to World, implemented by Global Nomads Group, is supported by the Stevens Initiative, which is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, with funding provided by the U.S. Government, and is administered by the Aspen Institute. The Stevens Initiative is also supported by the Bezos Family Foundation and the governments of Morocco and the United Arab Emirates.
When Amandeep came to Seattle University School of Law from her home in Texas, she had no idea she would become a passionate advocate for police reform. She was simply on her own path of breaking free from expectations and knew her place was somewhere in the realm of law.
Amandeep brought a spirit of reflection and defiance, which comes from her Sikh heritage and her Punjabi background, to her legal education, with profound effect. In the fall of 2021, she enrolled in the Transitional Justice Legal Exchange, a class that connects law students from Seattle University and Moulay Ismail University in Meknes, Morocco through virtual exchange. The course explores how each country confronts the problem of state-sanctioned violence – in the United States, police brutality against communities of color; and in Morocco, a history of government violence against political dissidents.
“Policing is very action-based work, so my final project for the class looked at how to incorporate more opportunities for reflection in the training process, something that increases awareness of bias and other cultural expectations,” she said.
Following the class, she completed an externship at the Criminal Justice Training Commission, where she put concepts from her project to use. The commission serves as the training academy for police recruits throughout Washington. As part of her work, Amandeep created a law handbook for responding to domestic violence calls, which account for as many as half of the calls that officers receive. She added depictions of culturally and racially diverse people, and included names that might be unusual or difficult to pronounce. She shared statistics about the higher rates of domestic violence against people of color and immigrant women.
She also encouraged instructors at the academy to include time for journaling and reflection at the end of each day, understanding the need for police recruits to process the feelings and emotional responses to the very difficult subjects they have to learn about. The recruits and instructors themselves were open about the challenges they faced in getting support for new ideas or different ways to carry out their duties as law enforcement, and despite the challenges, everyone was committed to creating a better tomorrow. “Taking a step into the world of policing as an outsider was eye-opening. Seeing the changes that the media pays little attention to and being able to give my perspective as a woman of color was empowering.”
As a student in the Transitional Justice Legal Exchange, Amandeep learned valuable communication skills that helped her in her work at the police academy. “It took time for the Moroccan students to open up about problems in their system,” she said. “The American students being open and honest about the struggles in our systems and our proposed solutions I think helped change that for them through[out] the semester. Through the exchange, both sides learned how important it is to look at our systems with a critical lens. I know my colleagues and I [also] learned the importance that acknowledging the good in our system is also a part of the process of change.”
Amandeep graduates from Seattle University School of Law in May 2023. She came to law school with an interest only in business law, but the virtual exchange with Morocco changed that goal.
“Nothing has felt as rewarding as what I’m working on now in this externship,” she said. “This makes me feel more fulfilled as a person, to be part of the solution and to create change. Maybe it'll help save someone's life someday, you know? It feels like very impactful work.”
The Transitional Justice Legal Exchange, implemented by Seattle University School of Law, is supported by the Stevens Initiative, which is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, with funding provided by the U.S. Government, and is administered by the Aspen Institute. The Stevens Initiative is also supported by the Bezos Family Foundation and the governments of Morocco and the United Arab Emirates.
The U.S. Department of State is pleased to announce the Fall 2022 Professional Fellows Program Alumni Impact Award (AIA) winners: Ms. Mary James Gill (Pakistan), Mr. Tawanda Collins Muzamwese (Zimbabwe), Ms. Cindy Giselle Regidor Rodriguez (Nicaragua), and Dr. Macdonald M. Metzger (USA).
With backgrounds in education and interdisciplinary training, law and public policy, media and journalism, and sustainability and environmental protections, these four AIA winners will join the Fall 2022 Professional Fellows Congress to accept their awards and share their experiences and achievements with current Fellows.
The Professional Fellows Congress is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, with funding provided by the U.S. Government and administered by World Learning, an international nonprofit organization.
The Professional Fellows Congress will take place in Washington, DC, October 31 - November 4, 2022. To learn more about the AIA winners, read their bios below.
(INTERNATIONAL AWARDEE, Pakistan) Ms. Mary James Gill, hosted by World Learning in Fall 2017, is a human rights lawyer, an activist, a former legislator, and a policy researcher. She is currently the Executive Director of the Center for Law and Justice, a minority-led policy research, advocacy, and development organization, working for disadvantaged communities and groups. She is also the founder of Pakistan's first advocacy campaign, Sweepers are Superheroes, which outlined the horrific attitudes toward and working conditions of sanitation workers in Pakistan and raised awareness regarding the dignity, safety, and social protection of these heroic workers. In recognition of providing a new paradigm for sanitation workers, she received the prestigious Swedish Anna Lindh Prize in 2020 and the Human Rights Prize of the French Republic in 2021.
Ms. Gill’s career began when, after passing a bachelor’s in political science with a role of honor, she chose to become a lawyer and a politician, despite the challenges of entering a profession in which most are male, Muslim, and of higher caste in Pakistan. As a legislative member, Ms. Gill contributed to enacting laws related to women, children, and religious minorities. From 2013 to 2018, she was a member of the legislative Punjab Assembly, and from 2015 to 2018, she was the convener of the Punjab Minority Advisory Council. She became a Professional Fellow in 2017 and has been an Executive Member of the Pak-US Alumni Network since 2021.
Ms. Gill completed her master's degree in public policy in 2021 and was invited to be a member of the Global Advisory Committee under the Initiative for Sanitation Workers. She later became a core committee member. The Initiative is a joint global advocacy project for the health, safety and dignity of sanitation workers of ILO, WHO, World Bank, WaterAid, and SNV, partially supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She is also a founding member of the Minority Women’s Forum, established in 2020. She is the co-author of Pakistan's pioneer research Shame and Stigma in Sanitation: Competing Faiths and Compromised Dignity, Safety and Employment Security of Sanitation Workers (2019) and the lead author of Stories of Resilience and Resolve: An Intersectional Study on the Plight of Non-Muslim Women and Girls in Pakistan (2022).
During the Professional Fellows Program in 2017, Ms. Gill completed a fellowship with Social Innovations Partners and Citizen Diplomacy International of Philadelphia, in partnership with World Learning.
(INTERNATIONAL AWARDEE, Zimbabwe) Mr. Tawanda Collins Muzamwese, hosted by Meridian International Center in Fall 2014, is an international consultant with a keen interest in empowering organizations in developing sustainability strategies, programs, and awareness, with a focus on environment, quality, health, and safety. He has undertaken consultancy, training, and capacity building in more than 30 countries across the world and has trained more than 1000 people in sustainability. Mr. Muzamwese is the founder of Toxiconsol Consultancy African Sustainability Consultants, a leading think tank in issues of environmental protection. His consultancy assignments have included the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), the International Labour Organization (ILO), Hivos, and the African Development Bank (AfDB). From 2016 to 2021, Mr. Muzamwese was the executive director of the Business Council for Sustainable Development Zimbabwe (BCSDZ), galvanizing and coordinating over 100 companies in an industry association to scale up environmental management at the corporate level. He holds a Master of Science Degree in Environmental and Energy Management
(cum laude) from the University of Twente, Netherlands, and also holds a Bachelor of Science Honours in applied environmental science with First Class/Distinction from the University of Zimbabwe. Tawanda is a Founding Editor-in-Chief of the
Green Business Gazette and a leading promoter of sustainability approaches.
(INTERNATIONAL AWARDEE, Nicaragua) Ms. Cindy Giselle Regidor Rodriguez, hosted by the International Center for Journalists in Spring 2019, is a Nicaraguan journalist with fifteen years of experience in print, television, and digital media. She holds a master's degree in Media, Peace and Conflict Studies from the United Nations University for Peace. She is currently part of the Nicaraguan news outlet Confidencial, the TV programs
Esta Noche and
Esta Semana, and the founder and editor of the
Nicas Migrantes (Nicaraguan migrants) section at
confidencial.com.ni. Ms. Regidor credits her experience in the Professional Fellows Program for her creation of
Nicas Migrantes, a successful Nicaraguan media entrepreneurship that benefits the Nicaragua society, building bridges between the Nicaraguans who live in Nicaragua and Nicaraguan migrants who also deserve to be acknowledged and taken into account. Ms. Regidor is also a freelance correspondent for France 24 Spanish based in San Jose, Costa Rica, and has reported from Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica.
(U.S. CITIZEN AWARDEE) Dr. Macdonald M. Metzger, M.S., DPA, is being honored for his exemplary mentorship and hosting of Professional Fellows in partnership with the Institute on Community Integration. Dr. Metzger is the Director of Outreach, Education, and Interdisciplinary Training at the Institute on Community Integration (ICI), University of Minnesota. In this role, Metzger provides strategic direction and leadership for ICI's outreach, education, and interdisciplinary training programs. He coordinates the direction and growth of education, interdisciplinary training, and outreach programs to meet ICI's strategic initiatives. He supports the implementation of interdisciplinary training programs such as the MNLEND Fellowship and the Disability Policy Certificate programs, including community outreach and engagement activities. He leads strategic action plans that promote the MNLEND fellowships and the selection of learners from diverse racial and ethnic communities. He also leads as a creative resource throughout ICI for diversity-related initiatives, activities, materials, advice, and counsel.
Metzger is also an alumnus of the Association of University Centers on Disability (AUCD) Leadership Academy and a member of AUCD's Emerging Leader Community. Metzger is the founding President of the African Association of Disability and Self Advocacy Organizations (AADISAO). Prior to taking on a leadership role at ICI, Metzger served as a DirectCourse Quality Coordinator. In this role, he provided quality assurance for the DirectCourse curriculum from ICI's Research and Training Center on Community Living (RTC-CL). He was charged with overseeing the timely and quality production of online training materials, primarily for DirectCourse (the College of Direct Support; College of Frontline Supervision and Management, Person-Centered Counselling Curriculum; College of Recovery and Community Inclusion). He has extensive experience in supporting people with intellectual and developmental disabilities and mental health needs in a person-centered environment. He is a trained person-centered planner. Metzger's international work includes support for the implementation of the RTC-CL DirectCourse and Community-Based Rehabilitation (CBR) training of volunteers and CBR facilitators in Zambia and Liberia. He is a MNLEND faculty mentor and leadership team member. Dr. Metzger was recently selected by the U.S. Department of State to participate in its Professional Fellows Program on Inclusive Disability Employment (PFP-IDE) in Nairobi, Kenya and continues to serve as a virtual coach for PFP-IDE Fellows from East Africa. Metzger currently serves on the State of Minnesota’s HCBS Community Advisory Board and is Vice President of the National Association for Persons with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities and Mental Health Needs (NADD) membership committee.
Did you know that about one in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetime? For survivors, getting back on your feet afterwards can be the hardest job out there, and no one knows this better than breast cancer survivor, Spanish entrepreneur, and Academy for Women Entrepreneurs (AWE) ExchangeAlumni Teresa Ferreiro.
What did Ferreiro’s return to work and life post-cancer involve? And how has she applied lessons learned through her own journey to support others navigating the same challenges?
“I don’t believe in failure. I think it’s part of our development. At the end of the day, it’s about learning, and that’s how we progress,” Teresa says.
In this MentorTalks episode, Teresa also talks about how she’s empowering cancer patients to take control of their lives, shares advice for fellow entrepreneurs, and more.
Watch the episode now on Instagram to hear about Teresa’s journey, and also how her AWE experience equipped her with the skills and confidence to take on any challenge.
Teresa Ferreiro, in her own words (via
https://teresaferreiro.com/)
Speaker | Patient Advocate | Coaching Professional
At the age of 36, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was the beginning of a path that was unexpected at the time, and is still surprising today. Before cancer I was dedicated to project management in different multinationals. With cancer, without me imagining it, a new professional path arrived.
I wrote a book, A lump in the breast: You choose how to deal with it, which became a reference for many women.
Later I trained and certified myself as a professional coach, and with that I discovered many tools that could help countless people on their path to empowerment.
I decided to investigate how coaching could help people who have or have had breast cancer, and I spent more than five years working on my doctoral thesis, designing a methodology and a concept of coaching, coaching for patients, which are unique today.
In 2015 I founded Baby Beatles, an association that helps women who have had breast cancer to become mothers.
In 2019, the pharmaceutical industry awarded me the European Award for my work as a representative and advocate for patients.
I have been certified as a Professional Coach by CTI, as a Cancer Coach by the American Association of Cancer Coaches, and as a Systems Coach by ORSC. I am also trained in the use of the NEO personality questionnaire .
In addition, I work as a coach at the IMD business school in Switzerland, and I act as a patient advocate in multiple forums.
Doing a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship in Colombia had special meaning to Stephanie Jimenez. The New York City-born author and communications professional not only got to meet family members she’d never met before, but she also felt rooted in seeing where her ancestors came from. The international exchange experience wasn’t much of a culture shock, but she found herself in a new place culturally.
“I grew up within the context of Colombian music, Colombian songs, the food, certain phrases…All of that had been familiar to me growing up as a Colombian-Costa Rican American in New York City,” she says. “I grew up going to bakeries that sold Colombian pastries and Colombian bread.…There were parades I went to as a kid where I could partake in the culture, or at least the identity of what it means to be Colombian-American.”
I grew up within the context of Colombian music, Colombian songs, the food, certain phrases…All of that had been familiar to me growing up as a Colombian-Costa Rican American in New York City,” she says. “I grew up going to bakeries that sold Colombian pastries and Colombian bread.…There were parades I went to as a kid where I could partake in the culture, or at least the identity of what it means to be Colombian-American.”
While in Medellin, Colombia on her international exchange, Stephanie helped university students hone their English language skills and learn more about the culture of the United States. But she found herself somewhere culturally in between her students and where she grew up. Even her experiences of growing up Colombian and Puerto Rican-American in Queens, New York, made her “as much of a gringa as most Americans.” Even so, she says that she does identify as Latina, and that there’s something very specific about growing up as a person of color.
In Queens, she says that lots of kids who were ethnically Colombian or from different Latin American countries in the late 1980s to 1990s called themselves “Spanish.” That term is no longer in use, and she says it’s a factor of language evolving – and to her, what’s more interesting than the debate around calling oneself Hispanic, Latino, or Latinx are current debates around what it means to be a “white Latino” or white-passing.
“Those conversations are really helpful because they shed a light around what racism actually looks like in Latin America and within our own Latin American communities, both in the US and in the countries we come from,” she says. “There is a lot of entrenched racism that we have a responsibility of addressing and talking about and not just putting away.”
Conversations like these were especially meaningful to her during the Alumni TIES (Thematic International Exchange Seminar) in Minneapolis, Minnesota, themed around “American Identity” in March 2022. There, she served on a panel that centered around the topic, “Exploring the Foundation and Examining the Implications of the ‘American” Identity.’” Throughout the seminar, Stephanie met others doing work around race and preserving erased histories in the American context.
During that week, what was most interesting to her were the discussions from other writers, journalists, and academics on how to ensure that stories from communities that have been traditionally underrepresented, marginalized, and oppressed are told – whether through restoring historic gravesites, making sure burial sites are acknowledged, and tourism.
A writer’s and mentor’s path
In her writing life, Stephanie credits her time in the publishing industry with giving her an insight into the process that she didn’t have growing up. Her debut novel, They Could Have Named Her Anything (Little A), came out in August 2019 and was a work that came together while she was working different day jobs.
Working while writing is more common than not these days, but Stephanie says that if early on in her career she hadn’t had her job as an assistant at Penguin Random House – known as one of the “Big Four” publishing companies that dominate American publishing, she wouldn’t have known the process of getting published, let alone the conversations that took place in that sort of space. Not only that, but her work there demystified who could be an author.
“As I was starting to meet authors, I was like, these are just real people, these are flawed human beings just like anyone else,” she says. “They are not gods. They haven’t been bestowed this special light that makes them better than all of us and more capable of getting their work read. And more, worthy of having their words read.”
That insight, as well as her own feelings of being lost in the publishing process, gave her the confidence to send her work out and inspired her to give other people that same confidence and access to the system.
Anyone can be an author, she says, no matter what age they are. Her newsletter on her website is meant to inspire just that, especially for those who come from middle class or working class backgrounds, as well as underrepresented communities.
“As many people who come from working class or middle class backgrounds, there is this fear of studying the arts, because we all understand the trope of the starving artist and we all are worried about not making enough money in this capitalistic society,” she says.
Her antidote was to build her own community through writing classes and now in guiding others to become authors themselves. She says there are people in the industry who are trying to get more representation in the literary arts, especially with windows of free submissions to literary magazines for BIPOC (Black and Indigenous people of color) writers, but that the efforts are ongoing.
“How do you incentivize creative writing for people if that can’t actually sustain them? It’s constantly a question of if we look at the industry and we look at writers in general and they tend to skew disproportionately white, you can’t divorce that statistic from the fact that this is just not an industry that most people can make a living in,” she says. "If you don’t come from a lot of means, your first priority will be, how do I survive."
Stephanie is more than finding her way and she’s shining her light for others to find their way as well, both on her own and through the writers she holds dear.
One of her favorite quotes about where the drive to keep writing comes from is from the writer, Toni Morrison, who once wrote about writing, “I like the fact that other people like what I write, and I suppose that if the publishers had disappeared, I would have written it and Xeroxed it and passed it around. But writing was a thing that I could not not do at that point—it was a way of thinking for me. It still is; I don't have any choice about that.
