Annotations for Places: Villa-vicente Domingo

I was the first one to go into college. My father was born in a ranch, born in cowboy, worked as a cowboy before he got married, never went to school. My mother was born in Monterrey, Mexico, moved over here when she was nine or ten and went as far as the fifth grade.

This year the Council for the Advancement and Supportive Education in Washington DC chose out of almost 400 nominations, Dr. Vicente Domingo Villa as the recipient of the National Professor of the Year Award. Dr. Villa is a professor of biology at Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas. First of all, felicidades to Dr. Villa who now joins us on Latino USA. Dr. Villa, I understand that when you first started teaching at Southwestern University eight years ago that there were no Latino students there studying the sciences and now eight years later that almost 20% of those who graduate in the sciences from Southwestern are Hispanic students. So what happened and how can it happen in other places where it doesn't?

Indeed, the numbers have changed in the last eight years. I arrived at Southwestern University in '85 and not unlike what happens in many other institutions, unless you get a critical mass, unless you get someone working actively at encouraging the young people, the young Hispanics to come into the sciences, it happens, but it happens very slowly in some instances as the critical number goes up, the students themselves do the recruiting.

From everything that I've read, you just don't inspire from the lecture hall, but you take a very proactive, dynamic relationship with your students. Someone described you as part teacher, part parent, part pit bull. Is that correct?

[laughter] Well, that is correct to up to a certain point. I do agree with your statement that teaching, if I just restricted to the lecture hall and even the laboratory, the job is incomplete. Teaching means sharing and giving, and the bulk of the teaching actually occurs in my own experience at the level of what I call study with a prof sessions. I love to have a time period at the end of the day, at least once a week if not twice a week, where I ask my students, "Come and visit. If you're going to study on your own, why don't you come and spend that hour or two with me and let's study with together." At those sessions, I really get to know my students. I really get to know and get a good feel for where they're at, how well they're understanding the concepts. I also discover where they're going and I'm in a unique position of encouraging them. If they have a certain goal, I will encourage them to consider other options, especially if I can detect and I can see that they have the talent and they're just not shooting high enough. What a privilege to be in a position like that.

What advice would you have for parents or young students about education and then perhaps not just in the sciences but in general?

I was able to get an education because my education started at home and the parents play a key, key role. I come from a family that I was the first one to go into college. My father was born in a ranch, born a cowboy, worked as a cowboy before he got married, never went to school. My mother was born in Monterrey, Mexico, moved over here when she was nine or ten and went as far as the fifth grade. They played a key role in terms of the encouragement that they gave me. So to parents, I would stress that even if they have not obtained an education, they are involved in the process of educating their children and preparing them to get an education. The question may come up, "Well, but how can I?" Encouragement is a bottom line, encouragement. I was prepared for college work along the way and indeed my father always stressed, "Get an education. Get an education."

In his case, the experience that he went through, growing up in a ranch in south Texas, he never learned English. So then World War II comes around, he's drafted, here he's having to go serve and he doesn't know the language. So he went through some very, very trying times and I think that that was a lesson that was so well-placed in his own mind and his own heart that he would not have his children go through that. Now education is a sacrifice and if I were to tell you that getting an education is not a sacrifice, I would be lying to you. It's going to require work, but the beautiful thing about it is that it is a kind of work and a sacrifice that becomes fun as you become successful.

Thank you. Dr. Vicente Domingo Villa of Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas. Dr. Villa has been named the National Professor of the Year by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education.