Pa’lante, siempre pa’lante: pedagogies of the home among Puerto Rican college educated families

Abstract

Research focused on Latinas/os in higher education often examines patterns of failure, while neglecting factors that contribute to Latina/o generational familial success. This article focuses on intergenerational strategies taught within college-educated Puerto Rican households that assist in academic achievement and success in higher education. Delgado Bernal theorized pedagogies of the home to explain co-constructed cultural knowledge within Chicana/o households to challenge deficit perspectives. Through analysis of educational oral histories of four college-educated Puerto Rican families, pedagogies of the home are extended. The Puerto Rican college-educated children demonstrate sin pelos en la lengua (without mincing words), contradictions among college completers, and pa’lante siempre pa’lante (always moving forward) as strategies employed in navigating higher education. In rearticulating, pedagogies of the home for the Puerto Rican community, institutions of higher education can better respond to the various experiences of Latinas/os.

Keywords:

• Puerto Rican families
• higher education
• college completion
• teaching and strategies
• home

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

Notes

1 Translating from Spanish to English as “aspire” was established by Antonia Pantoja in the 1960s to empower Puerto Rican high school students to pursue a higher education. ASPIRA is a high school college access program still active today.

2 Translating from Spanish to English as “without mincing words” is often used in the Latina/o community to describe an individual’s verbal behavior.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nichole Margarita Garcia

Nichole M. Garcia, PhD is an Assistant Professor of Higher Education in the Graduate School of Education at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. Her research focuses on comparative studies of Chicanx/a/o and Puerto Rican college-educated families to advance narratives of intergenerational achievement and college choice processes. She employs mixed methods to examine inaccurate portrayals of educational outcomes for communities of color. In doing so, institutions of higher education can plan appropriate programs and evidence-based interventions to meet the growing needs of students.