“I’m particularly happy to be here with you, for those of you who are first-year students, so that we can go through this together—this moving to this cold place with strange food,” joked Tetlow, a longtime New Orleans resident who officially joined the Fordham community on July 1.

The students got an opportunity to mingle not only with each other and the new president but also with Armando Nuñez Jr., GABELLI ’82, chair-elect of Fordham’s Board of Trustees, and some prominent alumni from their native island, including Fordham trustee Gualberto J. Rodríguez-Feliciano, FCRH ’95, and Mario Porrata-Nieva, FCRH ’91.

John Buckley, GSE ’89, vice president for enrollment, said that in recent years, the number of first-year students from Puerto Rico has been steadily increasing. This fall, Fordham welcomed a “record-breaking” 17 students from the island. He credited the alumni for helping to spread the word about the value of a Fordham education and the difference it has made in their lives.

Finding a ‘Community of People Who Understand’ You

Cristina Flores, a Fordham junior from Dorado, a town on the northern coast of Puerto Rico, said she initially enrolled at a college in Philadelphia with her twin sister. After a year and a half, however, she didn’t feel at home there, so she transferred to Fordham’s Gabelli School of Business as a sophomore last spring.

“When I came here, I feel like I was able to find those people who do their thing, and I do mine, but at the same time have that community of people who understand me as a person,” said Flores, who is majoring in global business, with a concentration in global marketing with consumer insights.

She added that, while she misses “her other half,” she is glad she decided to transfer. And she isn’t without family in New York: On Sundays, she goes to church with her older sister, who also lives in the city. On campus, she’s involved with the FCLC Yoga and Mindfulness Club and is hoping to start a new club for students like her.

“We’re still trying to find people who want to join, but we want to be able to have that community for people who transfer from other colleges or are international students like myself,” she said.

Javier Méndez Lacomba, a first-year student from San Juan studying business administration with a double concentration in business economics and global business, said he was attracted by the University’s strong extracurriculars, including El Grito de Lares.

Founded more than 50 years ago, the student club successfully advocated for changes to the Fordham curriculum to reflect the growing diversity of students on campus in the late 1960s. The University launched a Puerto Rican studies program in fall 1970, one year after launching what would become the Department of African and African American Studies. In the mid-1990s, the Puerto Rican studies program expanded and changed its name to the Latin American and Latino Studies Institute. Today, El Grito de Lares offers Hispanic students a safe place to discuss their heritage and shared experiences.

Even with that, Lacomba said the transition to college life is not without its challenges, such as trying to connect with people who “perhaps don’t share the same interests or are from different social and political backgrounds.” While it doesn’t always go as fluidly as he would like, he said Fordham’s faculty and administration offer “the best resources” to help him and others connect with their fellow students.

Community, Connection, and Resilience

The idea of taking advantage of Fordham’s resources for academic and social support was one echoed by Rodríguez-Feliciano, an entrepreneur and co-founder of Nutriendo PR. During an emotional speech, the Fordham trustee recalled his days as an undergraduate in the 1990s and encouraged students prioritize their mental health and ask for help if they need it.

“I remember how strange it was: the temperature, the smells, the faces, the sounds, the sunsets, the mornings, the food, the music, the culture—so different,” he said, recalling what it felt like to move from Puerto Rico to New York City. “This institution cares about you specifically: you, your name. Let the system know, let people know that you’re having a hard time, and you’re going to get a beautiful response.

“I had that experience in sophomore year, when I was against the wall, and my theology professor was there for me,” said Rodríguez-Feliciano, who earned a bachelor’s degree in economics and political science from Fordham in 1995 and received a prestigious Harry S. Truman Scholarship, which he used to get an M.B.A. from Yale University. “I didn’t know I was being supported the whole time [at Fordham], but if I don’t open up, they can’t respond.”

During the event, Tetlow also spoke about the sense of resilience and community that she feels she shares with people from Puerto Rico, touching on the devastation Hurricane Fiona wrought in September.

“I lived through [Hurricane]  Katrina where my friends died, where I had to rescue my family with a friend on a boat, where [I had]  that sense of wondering if anyone cares … and months that turned into years of anguish and rebuilding and slogging effort only to face it again,” she said. “I say that not to remind you of that pain but to [let you]  know … that this experience that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy is also a fundamental part of who I am.”

“I see that strength in you,” she added. “So, I hope that I’ll see you on campus, that we’ll give each other that look that we know each other, and that we will learn this city together.”

“Fordham made me enjoy and pursue continuing education,” he said. “That’s probably why I have done so many different things, and I have changed every five years—not because I didn’t enjoy what I was doing [but because I wondered,]  ‘Now, what else can we learn? What new thing can we do?’ The lasting experience is that passion for learning—to continue learning.”

Drawing Some Inspiration from ‘Ol’ Blue Eyes’

Born in the Bronx not far from Fordham, Lamoso moved with his family to their native Puerto Rico when he was a toddler. Though the 1986 Fordham College at Rose Hill graduate doesn’t “remember anything about New York as a kid,” the city lured him back for college.

“It was clear to me and my parents that Frank Sinatra was right: If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere,” he said, referencing the singer’s 1979 hit about New York City, “Theme from New York, New York.”

Continuing the Catholic education he received in Puerto Rico, Lamoso enrolled at Fordham to study political science and economics. He had a grand plan to take what’s now known as a gap year, trekking through Spain with his friends, before ultimately returning to New York to attend law school.

That didn’t quite work out, and he went “from having it all figured out” to facing a year “with nowhere to go, no school applied to or anything.” As he’s done many times since, Lamoso made a new plan: He landed an internship at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, a white-shoe law firm based in the city, thanks to his educational background, Spanish proficiency, and Fordham connections—the hiring partner was a fellow Fordham graduate.

Creating Opportunity, New Business Ventures on the Island

After the internship, Lamoso returned to Puerto Rico to study law at the University of Puerto Rico, earning a J.D. in 1990. He’s displayed an entrepreneurial spirit throughout his career since: he’s practiced law, managed a venture capital fund, and launched various communications ventures.

In 2017, as he was contemplating his next career step, his mother was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer. It got him thinking not just about his own health and path but also about the health prospects of Puerto Rico as a whole.

“My friend at Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center was head of the colorectal division, and he asked me to send him pictures of my mother’s fridge and her food cabinet,” Lamoso said. “He sent it back to me with circles and said, ‘This is the reason. This is why.’”

His friend had circled all of the packaged, processed, microwaveable food his mother had been eating, having ceased cooking fresh, homemade meals after Lamoso’s father died 15 years earlier.

Lamoso became a pescatarian and started to examine the island’s food landscape: More than 80% of Puerto Rico’s food is imported, he said, including more than 95% of its greens. Thinking of his grandfather and great-grandfather, who were coffee farmers, he decided to return to his family’s roots. He launched Explora Greens, a 60,000-square-foot hydroponic farming operation in Isabela, about two hours away from San Juan.

Just as it was getting off the ground and Lamoso was preparing to open a new greenhouse, Hurricane Maria hit, delaying his expansion plans for a few months but underscoring the need for greater self-sufficiency and a stronger local food system on the island.

Improving Fresh Food Access

Fast forward five years, and Lamoso’s farm is up and running. Explore Greens produces a leafy, Dutch lettuce in the butterhead lettuce family, and romaine, which they distribute to more than 80 supermarkets on the island.

“I saw that we have a food safety issue, and it became amazingly obvious after Hurricane Maria,” he said. “When it comes to greens, we import over 1,200 containers—just in one food stuff, one of the line items in the supermarket.” He shared his hope that his company can help bring down that number. “If I can import-substitute at least 20 containers a year, I’ll be happy.”

Today, Lamoso has his hands in every facet of farm operation. Unlike the romantic notion his lawyer friends and many others have of running a farm, Lamoso said he does everything—from accounting and marketing to waking up at 4 a.m. to help harvest and package the greens—because “the farm doesn’t take care of itself.”

Fostering Fordham Ties

Amid all his entrepreneurial ventures, one thing has stayed constant: Lamoso is deeply tied to Fordham and committed to helping more students from Puerto Rico find a home at the Jesuit University of New York.

As a longtime member of the Alumni Chapter of Puerto Rico, Lamoso said he’s worked closely with Joseph M. McShane, S.J., Fordham’s outgoing president, to expose students on the island to the University.

Lamoso has done his part, too. He “started making calls” to prospective students and even met with them and encouraged them to apply to Fordham. As word spread that his was “the Fordham family,” he said he took it upon himself to interview and recommend even more students, with some help from his own children, who would spread the word among their friends, their friends’ siblings and relatives, classmates, and others.

As Fordham welcomes its new president, Tania Tetlow, J.D., next month, Lamoso said he’s hopeful the University can keep the momentum going in Puerto Rico.

“I actually feel very optimistic: I think that our new president can do it, can transmit that” excitement, he said.

Fordham Five (Plus One)

What are you most passionate about?
Learning experiences. I despise stagnation.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
At Fordham, I learned that the best advice actually comes from the dead—I mean books. Seneca, a Roman Stoic philosopher, keeps “instructing me” not to suffer in my imagination. Over the years, I have become better at this, but I still have work to do.

What’s your favorite place in New York City? In the world?
McSorley’s in the East Village. There is something about a beer house that has survived so much, especially the fads and taste of young generations in these fast-fashion times.

In the world, I have to say Laos because of the innocence kept by its people despite what the rest of the world has made them endure.

Name a book that has had a lasting influence on you.
Well, I am an avid reader, so you are going to have to allow me to mention more than one book.

The Art of Loving by Erich Fromm: A copy of it was given to me during Senior Week at Fordham by a retired Jesuit that had taught in Colegio San Ignacio in San Juan and was fond of Puerto Rico.

Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. My three colleagues in the [internship at the law firm] were so smart they made my head hurt. They got me into Dostoyevsky. I must be one of the few persons that misses having to ride the subway for an hour in the morning so I could read Russian literature.

Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl has … actually helped me take business risk and have the courage to embrace the changes that have allowed me to learn and grow.

Who is the Fordham grad or professor you admire most?
Father McShane, who I met after his first year as president. Both of my children are big fans of him, too, since they have known him since they were in kindergarten. Father McShane navigated Fordham through such difficult times and through so many challenges in the first part of the 21st century, such as lower government funding and aid, higher operating costs, increased competition for students, recruiting and retaining professors, a transformation to digital learning, and of course a pandemic. And he did it with an ace fighter pilot finesse that made it look so easy.

What are you optimistic about?
Now, I believe my children will live their mature lives in a democracy. I was afraid of the contrary until not long ago. I am also optimistic about Fordham, and in the long run I am even optimistic about climate change.

plucked from the folds of my skirt
and perfumed with citrus and sweat.

Behind me, las cabras and my cousins
calling baaaa-baaaa-baaaa.

In front, foggy glass pitcher
of sugar water in her hands.

I want to steal a lemon, feel the sting
of spring on my pursed lips.

Want to see her, squeezing
fruit again. Her, filling

the pitcher. Her, filling
each of our glasses to the brim.

—Li Yun Alvarado, Ph.D., GSAS ’09, ’15

About this Poem

My brother and I spent our summers with our extended family in Puerto Rico when we were kids. My grandparents had a limón tree in their backyard, and beyond the yard’s chain link fence there was a huge field full of goats that my cousins, brother, and I would spend hours imitating. I wrote this poem to honor Mama Merida, who passed away in 2007, and the many happy memories we had in that backyard. This poem has even more significance for me now that my papi, Jun Alvarado, has joined Mama Merida after he passed away in December.

About the Author

Li Yun Alvarado is the author of Words or Water (Finishing Line Press, 2016). She earned a Ph.D. in English at Fordham, where she also served as the graduate assistant for the Poets Out Loud reading series. A native New Yorker, she lives in California and takes frequent trips to Salinas, Puerto Rico, to visit la familia.

The 16,000 pounds of local fresh fruit and produce, including pineapples from Manatí, Santa Isabel papayas, and Guánica green plantains, were delivered to Baldor Specialty Foods facility in Hunts Point and distributed in partnership with City Harvest, the nonprofit known for distributing food surpluses to New Yorkers in need. Seniors, low-income families, front-line responders, and community centers that serve the area will land at the top of the list to receive the goods.

The donation is an effort to show solidarity with some of the city’s most vulnerable neighborhoods, many of which include large Latino, and in particular Puerto Rican, communities. The gift also represents a payback of kindness received by Puerto Ricans from New Yorkers after Hurricane Maria devastated the island, Rodríguez said.

Just before the hurricane, Rodríguez-Feliciano had met New York State Commissioner of Agriculture Richard Ball at a conference. The first email he received after the storm came from Ball. The two spent the next 20 months in a concerted effort to have New York support the island’s farmers by purchasing their produce; Puerto Ricans, in turn, purchased New York State apples.

“The state was developing fresh food markets where residents could use food stamps and they wanted to include offerings directly from Puerto Rican farmers,” he said.

Seeds of Collaboration

When Rodríguez-Feliciano was a sophomore majoring in political science and economic development at Fordham College at Rose Hill, Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham, was dean of the college. Father McShane mentored Rodríguez-Feliciano through the Matteo Ricci Society (now the Matteo Ricci Seminar), a group created by Father McShane as a way to encourage talented students to conduct research and pursue fellowships that support a more just society.

Rodríguez-Feliciano would go on to earn a Harry S. Truman Scholarship, which he used to examine the economy of his native Puerto Rico. He used the scholarship to get an MBA from the Yale School of Management and returned to Puerto Rico in 2002, after work experiences in economic development in the U.S.

“I wanted to study the issue of how to stir economic development in Puerto Rico, so I went back and looked at the history and options for the future,” he said.

Rodríguez-Feliciano spent five years total in the Bronx, four years at Fordham, and an additional year after he graduated living in the borough. It was then that he established the ties he maintains to this day.

Rodríguez-Feliciano said the first big immigration wave of Puerto Ricans moving to New York was caused in part by the displacement of farmers due to the development of the newly industrialized agriculture—many of the farmers settled in New York City.

“This is very much a part of my story here and Fordham encouraged me to pursue fellowships that could address those problems,” he said.

Rodríguez-Feliciano said he recognized the connection between the former farmers and their descendants in Bronx communities, which is mirrored by a recent influx of other Latin American communities immigrants fleeing economic hardship.

“Immigrants and brown communities seem invisible to the mainstream. Few have their hands on the structures of power,” he said.

As a result, underserved communities have to be resourceful and take care of one another out of necessity, he said, adding that corporations and their leadership could learn by paying attention to and nurturing communities like those in the South Bronx.

“These communities are generous, entrepreneurial, and solve their own problems by creating what they need, because no one is coming to rescue them,” he said.

He said that he expects that what he observed in Puerto Rico after Maria to play out in Latino communities amid the pandemic.

“We can look at these communities for example because they are collaborating all the time,” he said. “There are small crises in their lives all the time. They’re pooling resources all the time; they’re taking care of each other all the time.”

On their last day on the island, several Fordham alumni, staff, and friends spent the morning volunteering at La Fondita de Jesús, a local organization serving people who are homeless, including many affected by the hurricane. In the evening, they had the opportunity to attend the hit Broadway musical Hamilton, brought to Puerto Rico by creator Lin-Manuel Miranda to support local arts and culture initiatives that promote tourism and economic recovery. And, thanks to Fordham Law alumna and adjunct professor Vanessa Nadal, who is married to Miranda, the group also enjoyed a private post-show reception.

Looking beyond the headlines, Gregory Acevedo, Ph.D., an associate professor at Fordham’s Graduate School of Social Service, says there is real human misery associated with immigration that we have a moral responsibility to address.

Listen here:

And in an extra track, Acevedo talks about the mental health needs of Puerto Ricans affected by Hurricane Maria who are expected to move to areas such as Florida and New York City this year.

Full transcript below:

Gregory Acevedo: U.S. social policy history’s really continuing history of reform and reaction. It really is this kind of like few steps forward, a few steps backwards. Maybe in the long rhythm of time, you’re moving forward. We have these regressive periods where we really do turn the clock back, unfortunately return to some past ways of thinking and doing. They’re never fully gone. There’s always some tinge of nativism that’s out there.

Patrick Verel: Few issues burn hotter on the worldwide stage today than immigration. In May, President Trump instituted a zero tolerance policy for anyone arriving at the southern border. Today, many immigrant children, who were taken from their parents there, have yet to be reunited. It’s rattling Europe as well. Italians recently elected a coalition government formed by two antiestablishment parties who share a common dislike of immigrants.

But beyond the headlines, Gregory Acevedo, an associate professor at Fordham’s Graduate School of Social Service says there is real human misery that we have a moral responsibility to address. I’m Patrick Verel and this is Fordham News.

What is the Immigrant Behavioral Health Roundtable project, and why is it so important these days?

Gregory Acevedo: The project’s being organized by the New York Immigration Coalition. They invited me because of the work that I’ve done in terms of immigrant and refugees and their mental health and social service needs. They’ve become concerned that with the Trump administration’s current policies that it’s having a negative impact on the behavioral and mental health of immigrant communities in New York City and elsewhere, of course. It involves people from government, healthcare providers, researchers, advocacy, and community based organizations, and the actual community members themselves.

The goal really is to develop long term policy recommendations for how to increase access to behavioral health for immigrants. In response to the current crisis, but also with the long term view that after this crisis is gone, trying to improve really behavorial healthcare access for immigrants period. It’s important because behavioral health is such a critical component of wellbeing for any person, non-immigrant or migrant alike. For example, behavorial health affects our physical health, our relationships, our job performance.

Migration inherently involves stress. Even a legal migrant coming with all their papers, well-resourced, there’s going to be some degree of stress. For any migrant, the context of the reception that they receive is a powerful determinant of how they’re able to cope with that stress. I think unwelcoming contexts heighten the risk of behavorial health problems occurring. We’re certainly in current context that’s pretty unwelcoming.

Patrick Verel: A key aspect of the debate happening in the country is the distinction between immigrants who come here legally and those who come here illegally. From a mental health perspective, do you see any distinction between these two?

Gregory Acevedo: Yes, insofar as illegality involves a higher level of, let’s say, risk and uncertainty. The fact that it heightens anxiety and insecurity. The fact that kind of living on the run, as it were, involves additional stressors than those that are already part of the stress involved in migration. I think there’s definitely a difference between an illegal journey and a legal journey.

I think it, for a healthcare provider or a mental healthcare provider, the issue is to be attuned to the fact that illegality brings with it, if you will, a certain level of being guarded. Clients or patients might not be as forthcoming or open about their experience, about their feelings, about their wants, their needs. I think that kind of guarded response is rational, but it may appear to somebody who isn’t taking that into account as something that’s, in the old parlance I guess, a resistance. I think you have to understand it from the point of view of someone who has an illegal status and the way that it changes their behavior really.

Patrick Verel: When it comes to your ethical responsibility to offer care, I would imagine that there is no distinction though.

Gregory Acevedo: Oh, of course, yeah. I think clearly morally I don’t find a distinction. It’s a technical issue, first of all legally. It’s an issue that’s important in terms of understanding, as I said earlier, people’s behavior. But I’m very clear about my … you’re here to serve everyone, right? So it’s the idea that you don’t make those distinctions. Clearly, from a human rights framework, which I think is very important, those aren’t distinctions that have any validity when it comes to receiving treatment.

Patrick Verel: Anti-immigrant sentiment is not a new phenomenon in this country, of course. Are there any lessons from the past that you incorporate into your work?

Gregory Acevedo: I teach courses on advocacy and policy practice. I use the example actually of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 because it really offers a great lesson on time, if you will. That act actually undid the racialized national origins quota system that we had in place since the early 1900’s in U.S. immigration policy. It took decades of political effort and social cultural change to really undo a deeply entrenched nativism that informed that national origins quota system that we had.

When I teach a course content on policy and advocacy work, I always emphasize the long view and the importance of the long view. There’s a sentiment that was expressed centuries ago by Rabbi Tarfon, I now share with my students, “It’s not your responsibility to finish the work of perfecting the world, but you are not free to desist from it either.”

The idea is that you’re probably not going to see that change that you’re looking for immediately, maybe even in your lifetime, but that shouldn’t lead to cynicism, pessimism or walking away from the work. You have to stay in that work for the long term.

Patrick Verel: The thing that keeps coming up is this notion of the fear of the other. It’s something that is, like I said, it’s not new. We experienced before. It seemed like we sort of got a little over it. Now we’re right back where we started it seems like. Any idea why?

Gregory Acevedo: One of my favorite scholars in this area, when he writes about actually the history of the war on poverty. There’s this big debate, the war on poverty was a success, was it a failure, et cetera. I think he reframes it in an important way where he says, “History, U.S. social policy history is really a continuing history of reform and reaction.” It really is this like a few steps forward, a few steps backwards and maybe in the long rhythm of time, you’re moving forward. But we truly, we have these regressive periods where we really do turn the clock back and, unfortunately, return to some past ways of thinking and doing. They’re never fully gone. There’s always some tinge of nativism that’s out there.

Then global events and other events and national kinds of currents change and it sparks up and it’s back again. You can say this about almost any major policy issue in U.S. History. There’s a quote I use a lot in class. I think it was Karl Deutsch from the Harvard School, Kennedy School of Government. He talked about how U.S. social welfare policy history follows the random walk of a drunkard. They think they’re moving forward, but they’re stumbling from side to side. Sometimes they’re even moving backwards. They might fall on their face. They have to get back up again. It is, it’s one of those times when I think we’re taking a great step backwards unfortunately.

Patrick Verel: When you talk about the work that you’re doing, how much of that is discussed, this notion that, “Okay, we take two steps forward on this issue, but sometimes we take one step back”?

Gregory Acevedo: I mean, I think it’s almost natural that that topic comes up. It’s based really on a generational point of view. If you’ve been around a while, you’ve seen these things before. Many of my students are younger. They weren’t even born during the Reagan years. Yet, I see many parallels between the Trump administration and the Reagan administration. I think that is just naturally in the minds of many folks who do this kind of work. It’s that idea that we’re still working on Dr. King’s Dream. You really have to be vigilant. This work has to be ongoing ’cause it’s so easy to slip back and go back to an earlier period.

Extra Track

Patrick Verel: It’s been estimated that between 114,000 and 213,000 Puerto Ricans will move to the U.S. mainland over the next 12 months as a result of the devastation of Hurricane Maria. I would imagine many of them will move here to New York City. What should those in social services working with that population be paying close attention to?

Gregory Acevedo: I think some of the central issues are trauma, which, thankfully, these days in terms of providing particularly mental health services, has become an important aspect of how we think about how we do our work. These days, many things go under the moniker of trauma informed or practice, for example. This idea of trauma, I think social workers and mental health practitioners, many of them will have that already in their toolkit and to recognize that there is layers of trauma involved here. There is the trauma of the actual hurricane and the devastation and dislocation of that. There is the trauma of the reaction of the United States and the lack of provisioning and care and the kind of like dealing with the crisis once the hurricane happened. Then there’s the trauma involved of being uprooted, having to move perhaps when you didn’t want to, relocating to a place that you hadn’t even planned for. There’s a big thing in the literature on migration that the longer you have to plan and the better the plan and preparation you have to migrate, the more it lowers the stressor involved in migration.

Being unprepared, being dislodged, having to do it without doing it voluntarily but involuntarily, I think the level of trauma is really high for a lot of Puerto Ricans. Then there’s the continuing kind of traumatic experience of almost being shunned and ignored by your own country, which I think is shameful. I think that that’s very real to many Puerto Ricans and yet for many Americans who are not Puerto Ricans, I don’t think it’s something they fully fathom or understand.

And there’s the concrete services that are needed. Places to stay that are long-term, not just sheltered. If people want to relocate and stay for a long time, what are they doing to need? Connecting up with schools, with other services that are needed.

I really do think it’s being attuned to the fact that there’s going to be this need for these concrete services and there’s going to be this need for the mental health and behavioral aspects that are involved. I think that’s what mental health practitioners probably need to be most attuned with when it comes to working with Puerto Ricans who’ve been basically dislodged by the hurricane. It’s kind of like an exile of sorts where you’re not quite sure when you can go back, right? And so, when will Puerto Rico be up and running again? I mean, it is for some folks, right? It’s like anywhere else where if you’re probably in San Juan and some of the more urbanized areas, things are probably better off than if you’re elsewhere. Of course, those who have already had more resources and privileged are probably doing better than those who don’t. I think that’s another thing that we need to account for. There’s a certain type of Puerto Rican migrant that’s going to come to the United States, and its a lot more about issue of resourcing than anything else.

Both women teach full time at the Graduate School of Education (GSE) and have deep family roots on the island. Gonzalez, a native of the Bronx and clinical assistant professor in the college’s Division of Educational Leadership, Administration and Policy, has been visiting her family in the city of Ponce every summer since she was in kindergarten. She spent several years there as an exchange student while earning a bachelor’s degree at Lehman College.

Nevárez-La Torre, an associate professor of in the Division of Curriculum and Teaching, was born and raised on the island. Although she moved to the mainland when she was 25, her family still lives the town of Guaynabo and some still live in the town of Lares, in the mountainous northeast region.

A Connection to Fordham

They have professional connections as well: When González earned her doctorate in 2016, her dissertation was on public school leadership in Puerto Rico. One of the people she has stayed in touch with is Isaac Ruiz Solá, Ph.D., the principal of Escuela Julio Alvarado Tricoche, an elementary school in Ponce. When she reached out to him after the storm, his response was “We need everything.”

“So, we said, ‘Let’s take something off your plate.’ School supplies are really hard to come by in Puerto Rico schools. Most teachers have to pay for the supplies for their classroom,” said González.

“Parents are not going to think about buying school supplies when they need food, water, and gas for their generators.”

The two reached out to their GSE colleagues and raised nearly $2,000, which they used to buy notebooks, pencils, crayons, scissors, construction paper, and other assorted school supplies.

A Joyful Presentation

On January 10, the day after Escuela Julio Alvarado Tricoche reopened for the first time since the storm had hit, they presented 16 festively decorated boxes of supplies-one for each class-to the students. More than three months had passed since the storm hit, and residents were still struggling to put their lives back together. But the school staff still staged a catered ceremony to mark the occasion.

“The staff was traumatized on their own, but I have to tell you I’ve never seen a group of people come together and selflessly put aside their own traumas and their own suffering to help the kids have a sense of a normal, joyful school,” said Nevárez-La Torre.

“They dressed up as clowns, they brought in music, and they danced with the kids. It was amazing.”

To the women, the ceremony was every bit as important as the act of giving material goods, because they were able to show their solidarity with the students and fellow teachers. Nevárez-La Torre viewed it as an extension of her professional work.

“Being a scholar in education is not just conducting research to benefit others through scholarly publications. It’s also making a difference in the lives of the people that we work with,” she said.

González noted that education is a field where relationships are key.

“We always say that students don’t learn from people who they feel don’t care about them,” she said.

“School supplies don’t fix a house, school supplies won’t put food on your table, but they are a gesture of a human kindness that we can express by standing side-by-side with you.”

Future Relief Efforts

Nevárez-La Torre and González plan to continue spearheading aid efforts, as the island is still in dire need of aid. Power outages are still common, and a recent report indicated that more than 10,000 small businesses-nearly 20 percent of the island’s total-were closed as of March 6.

“I don’t know that school supplies again will be the way,” said González. “We need to talk a little bit more with school principal and teachers and find out what would be the most helpful means of support, and then we can help them.”

The social-justice movement, which emphasizes solidarity with the poor, was championed by many Jesuits in Latin America at the time, and it made a deep impression on Fernández de Lahongrais. So when he was looking for colleges in New York, he was drawn to Fordham’s Jesuit mission.

Now, as a criminal defense attorney, he continues his commitment to social justice, often taking on pro bono cases in Washington, D.C., Boston, and his native Puerto Rico, where he still resides.

In late January, for example, he filed a complaint against the United States, demanding equal rights and obligations for U.S. citizens in Puerto Rico when it comes to federal funding for Medicaid, Medicare, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). Disparities in funding, he argued, violate the equal protection clause of the Fifth Amendment and put vulnerable groups—the poor, the elderly, and children—at risk.

In the past year, Fernández de Lahongrais has also found time to pursue another passion: teaching.

Last fall, the 1987 graduate of Fordham’s Gabelli School of Business returned to Rose Hill to teach The Ground Floor, a course that introduces Gabelli undergrads to various business disciplines. It’s a class he is particularly well suited to teach. After graduating from Fordham, he passed the CPA exam and later earned an M.B.A. in finance.

“The kids were so smart, and so well prepared,” he said of his first teaching experience. He took his class on field trips to the New York Stock Exchange and Credit Suisse, and he added case studies to each section of the curriculum to help students get in-depth knowledge of the different career paths they could take.

Fernández de Lahongrais has stayed in touch with many of his Fordham friends since graduation—his college roommate is the godfather of one of his three children. But it was only a few years ago that he reconnected with his alma mater. He joined the President’s Council, a select group of alumni and parent philanthropists committed to raising the University’s profile. And one of his daughters, Sofía, is now a sophomore at Gabelli; last fall she helped spearhead some of the on-campus efforts to help victims of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.

“We’re making Fordham our family university,” he said. “And I’m very happy to see where Fordham is going.”

Fordham Five

What are you most passionate about?
I’m most passionate about defending those who cannot defend themselves. I think the law is a beautiful thing, but it is sort of like a spiderweb. It’s beautifully intertwined and majestic, but it’s also great at catching the weak; the powerful can just punch through and break that spiderweb. That’s what I see every day, and it bothers me.

‪What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
To learn to write with my left hand. I really gave this advice to myself, but it changed everything. Right after Fordham, I joined the Navy. But just before leaving for Officer Candidate School, I broke my right hand, and they had to postpone my entry. I basically had nothing to do, so I decided to take the CPA exam. But I had to learn how to write with my left hand to study. And I did. That’s when I realized that there’s always a valid excuse not to do something, but the thing is, there’s always a way to do it anyway.

‪What’s your favorite place in New York City? In the world?
In New York, the Beacon [Theatre] and the Bowery. I love music, especially underground music and the old classics. I mean, I’ve seen so many great bands at the Beacon—like Hot Tuna and Elvis Costello—and on the Bowery. CBGB was a place I used to hang out when I was at Fordham. That’s where the Talking Heads and the Ramones started [in the ’70s]. It all reminds me of New York back then, when it was falling apart but it was very artistic.

In the world, Culebra Island. It’s actually part of Puerto Rico, but it’s still virgin land, virgin beaches, not really developed. It’s beautiful.

‪Name a book has had a lasting influence on you. Explain how and why.
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez. That book was so implausible. But the stories he was telling really described life in Latin America. He wrote about how some things never change, how we were stuck in time. And the way he wrote, I found it to be so magical, so incredible. He wasn’t telling me, he was showing me. That made me love to read literature.

‪Who is the Fordham grad or professor you admire most? Explain why.
Father McShane. He inspired me to give back to Fordham, and to do everything that I’m doing with the University. I also got closer to the church, because I had been disillusioned for a time. But seeing Father McShane and seeing our Jesuit pope from Argentina, I feel like things are changing.

President Barack Obama has named former federal judge Arthur J. Gonzalez, GABELLI ’69, LAW ’82, to the oversight board created by Congress to address the economic crisis in Puerto Rico, the White House has announced.

Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the New York University School of Law and former chief judge of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, is one of seven people appointed to the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico. The board was created on June 30 to restore economic opportunity in Puerto Rico by helping the U.S. territory restructure its debt and control spending.

Gonzalez grew up in Brooklyn, earned a degree in accounting from Fordham, and worked as a New York City public school teacher for 13 years before earning his Fordham law degree in 1982.

After serving in the IRS Office of Chief Counsel and working in private practice, he started his 17 years of service as a bankruptcy judge in 1995. He handled some of the nation’s largest and most high-profile bankruptcy cases, including those of Enron, WorldCom, and Chrysler, and was awarded the Medal of Achievement from the Fordham Law Alumni Association in 2012.

In a 2007 profile in FORDHAM magazine, he credited Fordham’s Jesuit tradition for the role it played in his career success. “Jesuit education encourages thinking, analysis, and generally provides a good foundation for understanding the subject matter while encouraging a commitment to community and service,” he said.