January 2025
Dear USLS students, faculty, friends, and community members,
Happy New Year! I hope that the winter vacations have provided all with the time to share with friends and family, and to regenerate for an exciting Spring semester ahead.
The US Latino/a Studies Program at Iowa State University continues ISU strong with cross-listed classes in the School of Ed, History, Anthropology, Spanish, and English, and with its own core, Community Engaged Learning classes. This semester USLS is offering the course, Latina/o/x Life Stories: Memoirs and Oral Histories, once again partnering with the Marshalltown Highschool students, in collaboration with their faculty mentor Kristin Stuchis. ISU students will be tutoring/sharing memoirs about belonging to Iowa from their myriad personal and family experiences, workshopping at the Marshalltown Library and Sloss House.
This academic year, 24/25, we have welcomed award winning faculty members to teach the Intro to Latino/a Studies Course both online and face to face. I want to welcome Fabiana de Paula who will be teaching the class this spring; and to thank Celeste Chaves and Julie Wilhelm for being part of the team and teaching to high praise from our students.
We have many exciting cross-listed courses and invite all to review the offerings both for this Spring and the upcoming Fall online.
For our annual invited speaker, I am delighted to announce that Dr. Mari Castañeda, Dean of the Commonwealth Honors College at the University of Massachusetts Amherst will be presenting Civic Engagement in Diverse Latinx Communities: Learning from Social Justice Partnerships in Action on April 3 at 7:00, the Sun Room, Memorial Union. Please stay posted as we will have events open to students and faculty.
I am just delighted to welcome new and old partnerships as we continue to learn and share about our robust cultures and supportive communities.
Warmest wishes,
Lucía M. Suárez, Ph.D.
Director, United States Latino/a Studies Program