My Action Research

Now that I have successfully presented my Action Research and have submitted my final paper, I feel it's only natural for me to reflect on the whole process of action research. I can still remember the day when I decided that I was going to focus my research on first-generation Latinas. It came at a time when I was personally doing a lot of reflecting about my racial and ethnic background and it was a big step for me in my identity development to choose this research topic. I was very interested in doing the research to learn the different challenges that face these students...well actually I wanted to see what was out there about the challenges that I knew I was faced and what things I didn't have to struggle with.

It was an interesting process for me to be able to reflect on my own experiences as a first-generation Latina. A lot of the research that I did really resonated it with me, specifically all the statisics that that I found about Latina pregnancy rates, Latinos lags in education and the number of Latinos that have a bachelors degree or higher in the United States. This statistics were honestly very surprising to me. However, it was seeing these statisics that helped me move from a place of shame to pride in my racial/ethnic background. I realized that instead of being ashamed of it I should be proud of everything I have overcome in my life despite everything that was in my way.

Having the opportunity to conduct the individual interviews with my participants was one of the most rewarding and eye-opening experiences in my graduate school career. Hearing their stories and being able to relate to each of them in a different way was an incredible feeling. It was so difficult not to continue the conversation outside of the interview and tell them about my own story. When I think about the creation of the discussion group, it legimately dissapoints me that I cannot be the one to implement this group and to see it all the way through. I would have loved to have been a part of this group and hear the stories of even more women from USD's campus. I really do hope this group ends up living up to the expectations of the participants and that it creates a space to begin to be able to make some effective changes to improve these student's experiences at USD.

When it came time to put my presentation together I had the hardest time because I had so much information that I wanted to include. Specifically, there were so many quotes from my participants that I thought were so effective in expressing the tensions they were each experiencing and I obviously could not include all of them. In fact, I ended up only being able to use five quotes in total, which was so difficult for me. However, I really did feel like I did a good job of effectively telling each participant's story, which was realy important to me. I still feel like I left out so much valuable information from my presentation, but I feel like I made the most of the time I had.

Now that the process is over for me, I can honestly say that having the opportunity to do this research has impacted me as a person, as an older sister, as a daughter, as a fiance, as a research, and as a higher education practitioner. Even though the process was draining and stressful, I am so grateful for this experience. I remember thinking when I first started writing my proposal last spring that this process was never going to end. I even remember questioning if I could actually carry out a research project this big. I am now very proud to say that I have completed an action research project and that it has made a difference in my life.

Thank you to everyone who helped me in any way get through this research!