Bonnie A. Lucero is the Director of the Center for Latino Studies and Associate Professor of History at the University of Houston-Downtown. Dr. Lucero has dedicated her career to advocating for equity and inclusion in higher education. Advancing the Hispanic-serving and Minority-serving mission of her institution, she leads initiatives to cultivate the unique talents of Latino and other minoritized students by providing educational experiences that embrace students’ racial, ethnic, and cultural identities. Towards that goal, she brings together faculty, students, and local partners to create and implement socially-empowering curriculum, innovative student support programs, cultural-enrichment opportunities, and purposeful community engagement in the heart of one of the most culturally-diverse cities in the United States. At the core of this project lies her vision to transform the traditional canons of academic knowledge by developing a dynamic, interdisciplinary learning experience in Latino Studies that not only features electives and extracurriculars, but also occupies a central space within the institution’s core curriculum and the students’ broader learning journeys. Before coming to Houston, Dr. Lucero focused her energies on expanding access to education among historically-marginalized populations in other communities along the Gulf Coast. As Law and Society Fellow at Tulane University’s Newcomb College Institute, she conducted research on racial inequality from an intersectional lens and applied insights in community programing in the greater New Orleans area. She taught incarcerated women at the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women in addition to mentoring undergraduate women in hands-on research experiences at home and abroad. Prior to that, Dr. Lucero worked as an educator on the Rio Grande Valley. There, she designed and implemented culturally-relevant programming and socially-empowering curriculum especially for Mexican-American students at the largest Hispanic-serving institution in the state of Texas. While working on the US-Mexico border, she founded and directed Global Latin America, an interdisciplinary lecture and engagement series highlighting the diverse cultural, ethnic, and racial heritages of Latinx and Latin American peoples. Dr. Lucero is the author of three books and numerous articles, book chapters, translations, and other publications. She resides in Kashmere Gardens, Houston.