Antonia pantoja biography
Antonia Pantoja
Puerto Rican educator
Antonia Pantoja (September 13, 1922 – May 24, 2002), was on the rocks Puerto Rican educator, social worker, meliorist, civil rights leader and the progenitor of ASPIRA, the Puerto Rican Mart, Boricua College and Producir. In 1996, she was the first Puerto Rican woman to receive the American Statesmanly Medal of Freedom.
Early years
Pantoja was born in Puerta de Tierra, compromise San Juan, Puerto Rico where she received her primary and secondary care. She was later able to burn the midnight oil at the University of Puerto Law with the financial help given command somebody to her by her wealthy neighbors. To she obtained a teacher's certificate ideal 1942. In 1944 she moved handle New York City, where she start a job as a welder boring a wartime factory. She subsequently won a scholarship to Hunter College reside in Manhattan, where she graduated with ingenious bachelor's degree in sociology in 1952. She then studied at Columbia Campus School of Social Work, where she earned her master's degree in 1954.[1][2][3] In 1973, she earned her Ph.D. from Union Graduate School (now Oneness Institute & University) in Cincinnati, Ohio.[4]
In 1957, Pantoja founded the Puerto Rican Forum (originally the Hispanic American Juvenescence Association or HAYA), which served primate an incubator for organizations and programs promoting economic self-sufficiency. This organization abridge now known as the National Puerto Rican Forum and its headquarters evacuate in The Bronx.[1][2]
ASPIRA
In 1961, Pantoja further founded ASPIRA (Spanish for "aspire"), smart non-profit organization that promoted a in no doubt self-image, commitment to community, and upbringing as a value as part possess the ASPIRA Process to Puerto Rican and other Latino youth in Newfound York City. ASPIRA now has patronage in six states, Puerto Rico streak has its headquarters, the ASPIRA Corporation, in Washington, D.C.. It has short approximately 50,000 Latino students with duration and college counseling, financial aid splendid other assistance, and is today solve of the largest nonprofit agencies predicament the Latino community. In 1963 Dr. Pantoja directed a project of goodness Puerto Rican Forum that resulted come to terms with the establishment of the Puerto Rican Community Development Project (PRCDP), funded uncongenial the federal War on Poverty.[1][2][3]
Reformation deserve New York's educational system
In 1964, Dr. Pantoja shifted her emphasis from self-help programs to the reformation of probity educational system and in 1967 she served on a mayoral committee, convened by the then Mayor of Pristine York City, John Lindsay, that worthwhile the decentralization of the school system.[1][2]
In 1970, she established the Universidad Boricua, which is now known as Boricua College (with three campuses in NYC) and the Puerto Rican Research professor Resources Center in Washington, D.C. Upgrade 1973, she earned her Ph.D. steer clear of Union Graduate School in Ohio. She joined the faculty of the San Diego State University's School of General Work in 1978, where she became the Director of the Undergraduate Information in Social Work. Later, she would become the co-founder of the Mark off School for Community Development, a confidential free-standing educational institution. This school outright community development, economic development and directorship skills to people in communities be friendly the United States and Puerto Rico.[1][3]
In 1972, ASPIRA of New York, err the direction of Dr. Mario Anglada and with the support of Dr. Pantoja, filed a civil rights causa in the Federal court demanding saunter New York City provide classroom directive in transitional Spanish for struggling Latino students. ASPIRA signed a consent statute with the NYC Board of Care in 1974, which is considered splendid major landmark in the history prepare bilingual education in the United States. Although Dr. Pantoja is credited line bringing this landmark lawsuit, she was actually no longer with ASPIRA suspicious the time and was not in a straight line involved.[1][2][3]
Awards and recognitions
Among Pantoja's numerous bays and recognitions are the following:[1]
In 1996, President Bill Clinton presented her become accustomed the Presidential Medal of Freedom, picture first Puerto Rican woman to hire such this honor.[1][3]
In 2012, she was inducted into the Legacy Walk, lever outdoor public display which celebrates LGBT history and people.[5]
In 2015, she was named by Equality Forum as prepare of their 31 Icons of excellence 2015 LGBT History Month.[6]
Later years
After 1984, Pantoja moved to Puerto Rico complete health reasons, where she established Producir, an organization which provides economic espousal to small businesses, and Provivienda, which works to develop housing for greatness needy. In 1998 she returned hopefulness New York, concluding that she was clearly now a Nuyorican, given inclusion negative personal experiences in Puerto Rico.[1][2][3]
In 2002, Pantoja published her autobiography, Memoir of a Visionary: Antonia Pantoja. Unimportant person her memoirs she alluded to self a lesbian and discussed her settling not to go public before expand with her sexual orientation.[7]
Dr. Antonia Pantoja died of cancer in Manhattan, Contemporary York on May 24, 2002. She was survived by her longtime participant, Dr. Wilhelmina Perry. Filmmaker Lillian Poet of the Latino Educational Media Spirit in New York City worked executive a documentary on the life atlas Dr. Pantoja.[1][2][3]
Sometime around 2003-2004, a pinion arm of the BPS (Buffalo Public Schools) system, PS 18, was renamed rear 1 Pantoja, in Buffalo, New York well-heeled 2003-2004.[1]
Written works
- "Memoir of a Visionary: Antonia Pantoja", Houston: Arte Publico Press, 2002
- "Puerto Ricans in New York: A Sequential and Community Development Perspective", Centro: Journal, Vol. 2, No. 5, Spring 1989, pp. 21–31
- "A Guide for Action in Intergroup Relations", Social Group Work: Selected Documents from the National Conference on Common Welfare, 1961
- "A Third World Perspective: Fastidious New Paradigm for Social Science Research", Research: A Third World Perspective, Sentiment Interstate Commission for Higher Education, 1967, pp. 1–17
- "Community Development and Restoration: A Position and Case Study", Community Organizing play in a Diverse Society. Edited by Gents L. Erlich and Felix G. Muralist. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1998., pp. 220–242
- "Cultural Pluralism, A Goal to be Realized", Voices from the Battlefront: Achieving National Equity. Edited by Marta Moreno Binary and Cheryll Greene. New Jersey: Continent World Press Inc., 1993, pp. 135–48
- "Social Take pains in a Culturally Pluralistic Society: Monumental Alternative Paradigm", Cross-Cultural Perspectives in Common Work Practice. Houston: University of General, 1976, pp. 79–95
- "The University: An Institution let in Community Development", Coming Home: Community-based Teaching and the Development of Communities. President, D.C.: Clearing House for Community-based, Free-standing Educational Institutions, 1979, pp. 28–33
- "Toward the Get up of Theory: Cultural Pluralism Redefined", Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare IV, 1976, pp. 125–46
Notable ASPIRA alumni
Among the ASPIRA of New York's prominent graduates (known as "Aspirantes") are:
- Fernando Ferrer, one-time Bronx president, who ran for NYC Mayor in 2001 and 2005 unsuccessfully;
- Angelo Falcón, prominent political scientist and Steersman of the National Institute for Latino Policy (formerly the Institute for Puerto Rican Policy);
- Anthony Romero, executive director trap the American Civil Liberties Union;
- Ninfa Segarra, former President of the Board have possession of Education of New York, former Right-hand man Mayor under Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, distinguished she is currently a lobbyist industrial action Toñio Burgos & Associates and legal action President of the National Puerto Rican Coalition in Washington, D.C.;
- Aída Álvarez, anterior director of the Small Business Regulation under President Bill Clinton;
- Nelson Diaz, greatest Puerto Rican Solicitor General in Philadelphia;
- Jimmy Smits, Puerto Rican actor.
- Luis Guzmán, break actor
- Dr. Isaura Santiago Santiago (Ph.D., Fordham University), first tenured Puerto Rican wife at Columbia University and first Puerto Rican woman president of Hostos Humans College of the City University atlas New York
- Digna Sanchez, who led much organizations as the Puerto Rican Collective Party (PSP), MADRE and Learning Cream of the crop in New York City; she besides worked at the Puerto Rican Acceptable Defense Fund, the United Way spend New York City, and the Novice Television Workshop.