Libby Juliá-Vázquez – Chief Content Officer – Chicago, IL
Libby was born in Rochester, NY and spent her life moving between Puerto Rico, Chicago and Utah. Her love for writing began at the age of 12 when she received a red journal for her birthday. Scarlett, as she named it, is still around holding some of the innermost thought of a sixth grader.
Libby is owner of Write Media, a freelance writing, communications company and also serves as online editor forNew Futuro. She joined Being Latino, Inc. in April 2010 as a contributor and was named Chief Content Officer in January 2011. Libby’s also active in the Chicago community writing about volunteer opportunities forexaminer.com and maintaining a blog about her Humboldt Park neighborhood. You can contact Libby via Facebook, Linkedin, or bleditor.libby@gmail.com.
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Nicolle Morales Kern – Senior Editor – Philadephia, PA
Nicolle is a passionate writer and photographer originally born in Philadelphia, but raised in England and Germany. She moved to Madrid, Spain in 2006 to start her college career at St. Louis University and then moved back to Philadelphia for the first time in 2007 to complete her B.A. in Journalism at Drexel University.
As a recent graduate, this avid reader and writer seeks to write and create pieces that encourage people to think and question what they already know, but also to show them the lighter side of life. Her goal is to educate herself on a variety of issues and then to share her findings with the world. Her interest in writing for Being Latino comes from the desire to explore what being Latino means for her as a German-Panamanian and to explore the depths of the Latino culture.
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Eileen Rivera-de la Hoz – Copy Editor – Hudson County, NJ
Eileen was born in The Bronx, to Puerto Rican parents. She grew up thinking the whole world was Latino. Moving to Rockland County in upstate New York taught her it wasn’t. One more move in 1976, brought her to Hudson County, New Jersey where she currently resides. She attended Rutgers-Newark where she majored in Social Work with a minor in Puerto Rican studies. Eileen credits her history professor, Dr. Olga Wagenheim, for the spark and impetus to search out her roots in a pre-computer era. The daughter of a minister, she credits her father for the activism, volunteerism and search for justice that have characterized her adult years.
The mother of two adult daughters, Eileen has worked in the Juvenile Justice system for twenty-eight years. She acts as a liaison between the Juvenile Detention Center and the Juvenile Court.
Writing was something she shared with family. Stories and songs for her children and Christmas tales for the extended family. She now shares her writing with a larger family, the Being Latino family.
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Irma Sanchez – Content Manager – Chicago, IL
Irma Sanchez, was born and raised in Dallas, Texas before moving to California three years ago for a job and now resides in Chicago, IL. She has been a fan of Being Latino for some time now. She was excited to be able to join and contribute to the already amazing team. In her personal life, she works as an International Relocation Consultant and has moved many families across the globe. She thanks her job for making her culturally sensitive and learning the art of patience. She has a B.A. in Decision Science and if you ask her what Decision Science is she will refer you to Wikipedia because she just listened to her counselor when deciding to get that degree and has long forgotten what it meant.
In her spare time—when she is not working because she is a self-proclaimed workaholic or doing things with Being Latino—she loves to paint. She claims that she is still in the learning phase and it will be a while before she shares her art with everyone. She enjoys reading anything and everything because she says if you are not in the know, how can you be prepared to debate? She also likes to travel and spend as much quality time with her family that she can as they are still in Texas. She has a small obsession with her youngest nephew and is now considered the boring aunt.
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Ryan Almodovar – Director of Writer Development – Lancaster, PA
Ryan Almodovar was born in Queens, NY, but was transplanted to Lancaster, PA – the heart of Amish country, at an early age. Growing up in a small city that is completely surrounded by fields has let him develop many interests, including jazz music, songwriting, short stories, and exploring the vast farmlands – simply because there wasn’t too much else to do there. A love of writing, thinking outside the box, and his Puerto Rican culture led him to a bachelor’s degree in Economics with a minor in Spanish from the Millersville University of Pennsylvania. Currently, Ryan is a mild-mannered banker during the day, and though he may claim to fight crime at night, you are most likely to find him relaxing by playing guitar, watching baseball games, or working on a novel that never seems to get finished. You can read more of Ryan’s work at his blog, Awkward and Dangerous.
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Adriana Villavicencio – New York, NYDr. Adriana Villavicencio is the youngest child of Ecuadorian immigrants. She has moved 29 times in her life, taking her on a journey from California to Bangalore, India, and New York City, where she recently earned a Ph.D. in Education Leadership and works as a Research Associate at New York University. An avid traveler, Adriana has collected experiences in four different continents and 16 different countries. But as a former high school English teacher, some of her fondest memories are those of her brilliant and brilliantly funny students in Brooklyn and Oakland. Adriana has contributed to several publications including the Daily News and Space.com, and is a managing editor for the Journal of Equity in Education. She earned a B.A. in English and an M.A. in English Education at Columbia University, and currently serves on the board of Columbia’s Latino Alumni Association (LAACU). She enjoys scary movies with red vines, Sauvignon Blanc, and her Maltese dog, Napoleon. To learn more about Adriana’s education consulting company, please visit www.theradicalideas.com.
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Eric Jude Cortes – New York, NY
Eric Jude Cortes describes his ethnic background as simply “New Yorker.” The son of an Italian mother and a Puerto Rican father, Eric Jude grew up in a Russian/Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn and attended extremely diverse public schools. Eric Jude credits his diverse upbringing with his success professionally, as since 2004 he has been teaching in a public high school with one of the largest percentage of foreign born students in the city. It is this diversity which has shaped his work for Being Latino, which have ranged from a lighthearted musing on the drink Malta, to a passionate diatribe against drug addicts. At the university level, Eric Jude has an MA in History, with a thesis on Contraband in Spanish Puerto Rico, from Brooklyn College. An avid traveler, Eric Jude’s bucket list includes a pledge to visit every Latin American country, something he has complete halfway so far. His secrets to success in life include faith, a type-A personality, and the ability to be silly and break into a dance at moment’s notice. Daily, he can be found running on your local street, lifting weights at your local gym, or praying at your local Catholic church.
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Cindy Tovar – Hudson County, NJ
Born in Flushing, Queens to Colombian parents, Cindy has always loved reading and writing. For this reason, she entered Montclair State University to pursue an English degree, but instead fell in love with and graduated with a B.A. in Psychology. During her time at Montclair State, Cindy joined the Latin American Student Organization (LASO) on campus. She immediately felt comfortable surrounded by peers that shared both love and pride for the Latino culture, something she had never experienced before. She ultimately became president of LASO. Since then, Cindy has earned her M.S. Ed. in Early Childhood Special Education from Bank Street College, and works as a bilingual Special Education preschool teacher in Brooklyn. Despite feeling exhausted by the time she reaches her New Jersey home, she still uses her spare time to write. Joining the Being Latino family is one of the best things that has happened to Cindy because it fulfills her in two ways: She can write to her heart’s content while reaching an engaging audience, and it helps her stay connected to her Latino culture. You can find more of Cindy’s writing on her personal blogs: Dagny’s Dichotomy, and Cindy’s Chronicles.
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Nick Baez – Fort Collins, CO
Nick Baez, M.S. is a native of New York, New York (Lower East Side) and currently resides in Fort Collins, Colorado. Throughout his academic and professional career, he has been a scholar in the fields of psychotherapy, anger and aggression research, trauma, youth leadership initiatives, and teaching. Committed to sound research and program development, Nick has been instrumental in tailoring programs to fit the needs of various communities, and subsequently evaluating those programs to ensure that they meet goals and standards. Nick is currently the Mental Health Therapist at Centennial High School in Fort Collins, CO. He has been a psychotherapist for 7 years, and specializes in adolescent populations. He has worked extensively with the National Hispanic Institute for 14 years, serving initially as a junior volunteer and currently as a senior staff member. Through his work with the National Hispanic Institute, Nick has worked closely with thousands of high school students in helping develop initiatives to prepare them for leadership in the 21st century. Nick has conducted peer-reviewed research on risky behavior, anger, anger expression, and aggression, and has been previously recognized for his work by the Rocky Mountain Psychological Association. Nick has also done research on psychological trauma and its effects on cognition and interpersonal relationships. He has been invited on numerous occasions to give special lectures on trauma, co-dependency, ethnic identity, and social conflict. A cum laude graduate of the College of Natural Sciences at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, CO, Nick holds a degree in Psychology. He additionally holds a Masters degree in Counseling Psychology from Colorado State University, and is currently a doctoral candidate there.
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Maitri Pamo – Woodstock, MD
Matri was born in Guatemala City and emigrated to the U.S. with her parents when she was a toddler. Her childhood years were spent in Washington D.C. She was fortunate to have been aided and encouraged to apply to a great school in Virginia by a teacher who saw a spark in her when she taught her in the DC public school system. Maitri was disadvantaged in that she then became the only Latina in her class for many years. When it came time to go to college, she left for New York City, the place of her childhood dreams, to attend Barnard College, Columbia University. She graduated with a degree in Foreign Area Studies, with a concentration in Latin America. When she finally realized what she wanted to do professionally, she enrolled in three extra years of undergraduate coursework in order to fulfill the requirements for application to veterinary medical school. She graduated from the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine with a degree of Doctor of Veterinary Medicine.
Daniel Cubias – Los Angeles, CA
Daniel Cubias is a writer based in Los Angeles. In addition to Being Latino, his work can be found in such publications as the Huffington Post, Change.org, Aqui magazine, and his website, the Hispanic Fanatic. In addition, he has been published in many literary journals and won the occasional writing contest.
He is a Wisconsin native who still roots for his hometown Milwaukee Brewers. He is way too much into horror movies, and he is inexplicably still unable to tune his guitar properly.
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Cristopher Rubio – Atlanta, GA
Cris was born in McAllen, Texas to a Mexican mother and Salvadoran father. A well-rounded student and basketball player in high school, Cris attended the University of Texas at Austin. As an undergrad, Cris was highly involved with various student organizations in the Latino community, including Lambda Theta Phi Latin Fraternity, Inc. He credits many of the people he met during this time with helping him realize his passion for equality and social justice.
After graduating with a B. A. in Mathematics, Cris was selected as a 2007 Teach for America Corps member in Atlanta, Georgia. He taught high school mathematics for three years in southwest Atlanta. In 2010, he enrolled at the University of Georgia to pursue a Master’s Degree in Educational administration and Policy. Although he has a passion for education, he’s just as passionate about writing, especially when it involves his community. He wishes he could spend less time watching basketball, fútbol, football, boxing and rooting for his beloved Arsenal, but some things can’t be helped.
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Luna Garcia – Brooklyn, NY
Luna was born in Barranquilla, Colombia. She moved to Brooklyn at the age of 16 leaving her family and her homeland behind. In 2010 she obtained a BA in Psychology from Baruch College that she is probably never going to use since she decided to go to Medical School and is now pursuing her pre-medical degree in Chemistry. Her experience as a young immigrant places her in-between the American born open minded young Latinos and the old school Born-There generation, allowing her to see any conflict from many perspectives.
Luna has always been a big fan of literature in both English and Spanish. Her obsession turned later into a love for writing and for all things Latino. Currently, Luna is trying to survive her second undergrad while exploiting New York City and looking for more opportunities to write. Her dream is to write fiction but most of her stories escape as soon as they’re about to be written.
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Hector Luis Alamo, Jr. – Chicago, IL
Hector Luis Alamo, Jr., is the political editor at Being Latino Online Magazine and a native son of Chicago’s Humboldt Park neighborhood. He received a B.A. in history at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where his concentration was on ethnic relations in the United States. While at UIC, he worked first as a staff writer for the Chicago Flame and later became the newspaper’s opinions editor. Since then he has contributed to various Chicago-area publications, most notably, Hispanically Speaking News and Gozamos. He has maintained a personal blog since 2007, YoungObservers.blogspot.com, where he discusses topics ranging from political history and philosophy to culture and music.
Being Latino Online Magazine 