By UW–Madison Graduate School communications
School of Education Ph.D. candidates Nancy Herrera and Dominic J. Ledesma have been selected for the 2020 cohort of the Edward Alexander Bouchet Graduate Honor Society’s UW–Madison Chapter.
The Bouchet Society provides scholars with a network of peers who exemplify character, leadership, scholarship, service, and advocacy for those who have been traditionally underrepresented in the academy. Induction into the society is both an individual honor and a welcome into this wider network of like-minded scholars.
Herrera is a doctoral candidate with the Department of Counseling Psychology and an Education Graduate Research Scholar. As a first-generation college student, she earned bachelor’s degrees in psychology and social behavior and Chicanx/Latinx studies from the University of California, Irvine. As an aspiring bilingual psychologist, supporting the mental health and educational success of historically minoritized communities through research and service are her personal and professional passion. She primarily utilizes the psychosociocultural (PSC) framework to conceptualize research on the educational processes and well-being of Latinx high school and college students, the effects intimate partner violence (IPV) and wellness for women of color, and the decolonization and ancestral healing of survivors of trauma.
Her dissertation pays homage to Latinas who are both college students and survivors of IPV, through exploring how they thrive through personal, cultural, and historical strengths and wellness, despite their trauma. She recently submitted a clinically-focused paper on the cultural considerations for college mental health professionals to support Latina survivors of trauma, and a chapter that reconceptualizes Selenidad through a higher educational context. As a woman of Mexican decent, scholarly work is her means of advocacy and educational resistance to challenge historical and deficit notions of mental health and working against the ideology to decolonialize the educational processes of Chicanx/Latinx communities.
Herrera’s commitment to serve students manifests in her teaching and leadership roles. For two years, she supported students on academic probation as an instructor and lead for the Academic Enhancement Seminars. In her current role as the co-director of UW–Madison’s Greater University Tutoring Service, she oversees the development and success of academic, language, and study support programs for undergraduate and graduate students. In her third year as a co-director, she also supervises and mentors 16 student staff to assist them in providing quality assistance to the campus community. Finally, she has provided mental health support to underserved students and monolingual Spanish speaking Latinx families in community, college, and medical settings. For the upcoming 2020021 academic year she will move to El Paso, Texas, to complete her predoctoral internship at the University of Texas at El Paso, primarily supporting children and college students migrating from Juarez, Mexico.
Ledesma is a doctoral candidate with the School of Education’s Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis. Following the completion of his undergraduate degree from UW–Madison, he went on to pursue a master’s in translation and interpretation from the Universidad Autónoma de Guadalajara (Mexico). His professional identity as a scholar-administrator draws from legal and critical educational research to examine aspects of organizational behavior and culture within predominantly white institutions. His research focuses on the strategic and systemic management of multilingual communication in federally funded activities and the socio-cultural factors that contribute to language-based forms of institutional power and privilege. Ledesma is a published translator and recently served as principal investigator on Project Hais Lus: Perspectives on Language Access, Cultural Barriers, and Multilingualism in Wisconsin’s Hmong communities.
Given Ledesma’s expertise on language access policies and practices, and its implications for promoting educational leadership that is equitable and inclusive, ELPA faculty members have invited him to share his research and administrative experience with their students in three different courses.
Read more about all of UW-Madison’s 2020 Bouchet Society inductees here.