Posted on December 5, 2024 by Katelyn Juarez
Fall 2024 Commencement Profile
Joshua Anzaldúa
Joshua Anzaldúa’s pursuit of a PhD in Educational Leadership at UTSA has been marked by resilience and a deep commitment to supporting historically underserved students. As a first-generation college student, Anzaldúa faced significant challenges early in life and in adulthood but persevered and remains committed to supporting students in navigating their life challenges.
Anzaldúa’s experiences as a college advisor and admissions officer fueled his desire to do more beyond his role to support students facing complex hardships. “I was working with a nursing student once who had just been admitted to the university, but she was having trouble with finding childcare,” Anzaldúa explained. Using the knowledge and skills gained in his graduate social work program, he shared, “I knew a group of people at an agency that could support her, and I was able to get her the help she needed, and she began school that fall semester.”
The desire to provide better support beyond individual practice and at a policy and institutional level for students led Anzaldúa to pursue his doctorate at UTSA. “I wanted to do research that can transform institutional policies, especially in the state of Texas, so we can provide more responsive services to address student needs holistically,” said Anzaldúa.
During his time as a doctoral research fellow at UTSA, Anzaldúa faced both challenges and triumphs. He initially struggled in his first year with self-doubt after a faculty member criticized his writing for being too critical. Despite self-doubt, he persevered, getting three research proposals accepted at conferences in his first semester. Anzaldúa credits supportive faculty, like Dr. Sofía Bahena, assistant professor in the UTSA Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, for helping develop his research skills, navigate the doctoral journey and encouraging him to apply for scholarly opportunities like the inaugural Equity in Higher Education Policy fellowship with The Education Trust in 2019. He received recognition in the academic community as a Barbara L. Jackson Scholar and David L. Clark Scholar, a graduate fellow with the Center for Black, Brown, and Queer Studies, a TACHE Career Leadership and Development fellow, and recipient of the 2023-2024 AERA Stress, Coping, and Resilience Special Interest Group dissertation grant.
The COVID-19 pandemic presented additional hurdles as Anzaldúa grappled with financial insecurity, the risk of homelessness, and a lack of secondary support and flexibility in his fellowship. However, he turned this adversity into an opportunity, writing his first refereed manuscript about making higher education more supportive of students who have experienced trauma, published in a comparative and international education book series. “I realized my university wasn’t the only one facing these challenges,” said Anzaldúa. “I wanted all universities to understand how these restrictive policies, especially amidst a global health crisis, can negatively impact students and, in many cases, become retraumatizing.”
For his dissertation, Anzaldúa examined the lived experiences of Edgewood I.S.D. alumni who were enrolled in the district between 1950-1968. He used critical trauma theory to explore how the politically-driven, race- and oppression-based and potentially traumatic coercion to deculturalization students—what he refers to as the “Americanization Agenda”—impacted Mexican-American students and their cultural identities, values, and beliefs systems. “I found that despite exposure to assimilation policies and practices that were primarily school-driven, which often disconnected them from their culture, language, traditions, and sense of self, my participants adapted and survived through intrapersonal and interpersonal means in ways that empowered them to reclaim or retain their culture, strengthening their families and community,” Anzaldúa explained.
Anzaldúa’s resilience and dedication paid off when he successfully defended his in-person dissertation alongside his dissertation chair and mentor, Dr. Mariela Rodríguez, a professor in the UTSA Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies. “When I walked back into the room, Dr. Rodríguez was crying, Dr. Bahena was crying—we were all crying,” Anzaldúa recalled. “They said ‘Congratulations, Dr. Anzaldúa,’ it was a meaningful moment because they understood my journey of self-doubt on this six-year doctoral journey yet have always been there to remind me that I am worthy.”
Following graduation, Anzaldúa plans to continue advocating for more responsive and trauma-informed student support structures at higher education institutions through research, especially at Hispanic-serving institutions like UTSA.
— Katelyn Juarez
