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February 28, 2008
2008 Frederick A. Cervantes Premio Recipient
Joaquín Castañeda of MEChA de CSUS has been named the 2008 Frederick A. Cervantes Undergraduate Premio recipient. The announcement comes in the Pre-Conference issue of Noticias de NACCS.
Joaquín will present his work during the student plenary on Friday, March 21, 2008 at the NACCS conference in Austin, TX. His paper is entitled: “The Oak Park Redevelopment Plan Housing Policy Implications for a Community Undergoing Early Stage Gentrification.”
SOURCE: Noticias de NACCS Volume 37, Number 1
(http://www.naccs.org/images/naccs/archives/2008_PreCon.pdf)
Joaquín Castañeda was born and raised in La Puente, east of Los Angeles, California. He is currently a senior majoring in Government and Chicano-Latino Studies at the California State University, Sacramento with plans on entering a Doctoral program in the area of Sociology or Education Policy in the fall of 2009. His commitment to research and community praxis has been shaped and fueled by his passion to remedy the very same inequities he and his community has and continues to face. His experience of an urban upbringing and the environment of inequities has motivated his deep desire to promote social justice and social change. Joaquin refuses to view the struggles he has encountered thus far as forms of victimization, but rather as opportunities for developing a critical perspective and a deeper fundamental understanding of urban education, politics, and culture.
He states he is someone who never formally graduated from High School and spent years taking remedial courses to reach college level material. Upon reflection, Joaquin is grateful for his Chicana/o Studies courses for they have provided him with the space and discourse to make links between the material conditions of his community and scholarship. Mechistas, profesores, comunidad, and his familia have been instrumental in the process and continue to be an insatiable source of inspiration, ganas, and the greater sense of purpose in his academic endeavors. He is thankful for their unconditional support!
A leader in MEChA de CSUS, he serves as chair for both Public Relations and the Political Committee. In 2006, he help organize a successful action in the advocacy of student space at CSUS by organizing students, faculty and staff to demand that a permanent Director for the Multicultural Center be made a priority of the University. He was not going to originally submit his paper due to the conflict of schedules between the 2008 National MEChA Conference and NACCS Annual, but was highly encouraged by a faculty mentor to submit his paper. Joaquin feels very honored by this recognition and as his mother would say "le dio un patatus." His paper addresses gentrification and displacement of a Raza neighbor in Sacramento. His research was funded and supported by the campus McNair program.
Good job Joaquín!
