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Edwin sharing his doctoral dissertation with Dr. Freeman Hrabowski. His dissertation focused on a program started under Dr. Hrabowski’s leadership in the late 1980s at UMBC.

On January 22, 2026, the Diana Natalicio Institute for Hispanic Student Success hosted its impact and legacy event in honor of Dr. Diana Natalicio. The program featured conversations about the future of higher education, including the inaugural Shiloff family lecture series, delivered by Dr. Freeman A. Hrabowski III, an esteemed national leader in STEM education. In the days leading up to the event, I kept returning to a question: how did someone like me end up in spaces like these?

Connecting Opportunity from UMBC to ¶¶Òõ¶ÌÊÓƵ and Beyond

I am currently a Postdoctoral Scholar at the Natalicio Institute, conducting research at the intersection of STEM education, organizational change, and Hispanic-Serving Institutions, to understand how we can create more durable and expansive opportunity across the nation. Yet, I began my academic journey as a first-generation, low-income student who did not know how to apply for college, much less what a Ph.D. was. I am where I am today because of programs and people who saw something in me before I could see it for myself. One of those people was my doctoral advisor, Dr. Sylvia Hurtado, with whom I investigated the adaptation of the Meyerhoff Scholars Program, a nationally recognized model for increasing diverse participation in STEM PhDs. That work became the foundation for , which focused on how STEM programs are implemented, adapted, and sustained across varying institutional contexts.  

The Meyerhoff Scholars Program began in 1988 at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, under the leadership of Dr. Hrabowski. At its inception, the Meyerhoff program was an experimental initiative, one that required sustained resources, buy-in, and patience. The large-scale impact of the program did not materialize within a single cohort, rather it required nearly 15 years to begin to see its national effects. As Dr. Hrabowski explains in his book The Empowered University, “work that matters … is not accomplished overnight” (p. 112).

A Higher Education Path More than Three Decades in the Making

This sentiment was at the forefront of my mind as I prepared for the Institute’s impact event and to meet Dr. Hrabowski in person. I reflected on the fact that my dissertation, completed in 2023, has origins tracing back to that 1988 commitment that Dr. Hrabowski and his colleagues made to underrepresented student success in STEM. More than that, the questions I pursued, the expertise I developed, and the work that I now carry forward all have roots in efforts that began long before I entered higher education. Having the opportunity to meet Dr. Hrabowski felt like a momentous occasion, one that deserved to be commemorated. Thankfully, my wife had printed and bound a copy of my dissertation, which I decided would be a well-fitting testament to the long-term impact of sustained investments. Over the course of the impact event, I had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Hrabowski, and after his lecture I asked him for a picture and to sign my dissertation. I handed him my dissertation and thanked him. I told him, “Without your work, this would not have been possible.” In turn, Dr. Hrabowski gleefully signed “To Edwin: I am so proud of you.”

This exchange captured something we often overlook in higher education policy: investments bear fruit slowly. Today, we face a political moment marked by funding cuts to longstanding STEM initiatives, efforts that have helped to uplift generations of scientists, researchers, and leaders. We are facing a policy context that is increasingly seeking short-term outcomes over long-term transformative change. The example of the Meyerhoff program demonstrates that arriving to a final product, like greater STEM PhDs, requires long-term commitments, ones that cannot be assessed on abbreviated timelines. My dissertation is also one small example of how such investments compound over time. It exists because dedicated leaders in 1988 and to the present day decided that addressing disparate outcomes in STEM fields is an effort worth undertaking.

We Must Invest Today to Lead in the Future

As I continue shaping my scholarly identity and the research I advance at the Natalicio Institute, I return often to the idea that great societies are built when people plant trees whose shade they may never sit in. Today, I stand in the shade of commitments and work carried out decades ago. For me, this carries a social responsibility, one that requires honoring the long-term investments and people who made my path possible. As we navigate funding uncertainty and shifting policy priorities, the question should not be whether long-term commitments to STEM efforts matter. The question is whether we are willing to sustain them for the next generation. If over three decades of commitments could shape my trajectory, what might the next three decades make possible? The futures we hope to see will not emerge on their own; they will be built on what we choose to protect today. I am grateful to be a part of the Diana Natalicio Institute, where we honor past commitments by serving as stewards of tomorrow.