Interview with Judith Rosario, August 2, 2013

CANCEL: Thank you so much, Judith, for giving us the opportunity to interview you today.

ROSARIO: Oh, thank you, it's my pleasure.

CANCEL: Can you give us your name, date of birth, and your place of birth?

ROSARIO: My name is Judith Margarita Rosario Santiago, and my date of birth is August 24th, 1958, and I was born in Ciales, Puerto Rico.

CANCEL: What are the names of your parents and what were their occupations?

ROSARIO: My father's name was Eli Samuel Rosario and my mom's name was Margarita Santiago. Both worked in labor. Factories. My father and my mom, both in Puerto 00:01:00Rico and in New York, where I was raised. My mom also worked as a child caretaker for foster kids in New York and my father basically worked all his life as either labor in factories or foreman in factories until he received disability and then he was retired.

CANCEL: If not born in Wisconsin, what brought you to Wisconsin?

ROSARIO: Ooh. What brought me to Wisconsin was probably my sister. She was living in Racine, Wisconsin. Working in Illinois, I believe, with Abbott Laboratories and I was living in the East Coast. And she's my only sister, other 00:02:00than my older brother, and so she kept, I guess, pestering me to come live near her and so I moved to Wisconsin, I believe-- I don't even remember, I have to jog my mind now. But that's how I came to Wisconsin.

CANCEL: Nice. Do you have any other family here in the continental US?

ROSARIO: Oh yes. My sister lives now in Tampa. My mom lives in Orlando, and I have some aunts and uncles in the Orlando area. New York, Virginia, D.C., and some in the West Coast.

CANCEL: They're all over.

ROSARIO: More or less.

CANCEL: As a child, do you remember a story or memory that will later shape your activism along the future?

ROSARIO: Wow. Yeah. I think one of my role models is my aunt who passed. She was a Special Ed teacher and I remember her saying in Spanish to me, "Las personas pequeñas siempre necesitan ayuda de los demás." Meaning the little people or people who don't have a voice need

a voice from those that have a voice. And I've always remembered that from being very small. I don't know how but. . .

CANCEL: A very meaningful quote.

ROSARIO: Oh, yeah.

CANCEL: Why did you choose to get a degree in Education and Criminal Justice?

ROSARIO: Wow. Well, as I said, my role model was my aunt and all my whole life I thought I wanted to become a teacher. Which I think, in a sense, I kind of am, 00:04:00although I have taught in different capacities. Because of what I saw she did as when I grew up, you know, she had all these kids in her classroom that had special needs. And she was fantastic with them, to the point that one of her special ed children, she kind of adopted and I considered my younger sister. . . Which after she started living with her and with our families and whatnot, we discovered that she really didn't have any special needs. She just needed someone to direct her and she's one of the greatest women that I know right now.

CANCEL: That's beautiful. She really lives by the quote she told you.

ROSARIO: Yeah, she did. She does. She really. . . Well, she passed. So yeah, I went into education. I taught for a little bit. My first education one was being a teacher for K-6th grade. Great start, but it wasn't kind of my calling. Went back to school and got a BA in Criminal Justice. I started actually in Sociology because I love the study of society and what can you do with it. A lot of the courses in college that I took, one of the things that my aunt also told me: "When you go into college, if you don't know what you want to do, start taking courses that attract you and the more you take, the more you learn, something will gravitate." So yeah, I went from psychology to philosophy and then I ended 00:06:00up in sociology. And then in the University of Interamericana of Puerto Rico, they started the degree in criminal justice. It was the first time they were going to offer that degree. And actually, my class was the first class of the criminal justice background. I did a minor in Criminal Investigations. I worked for many years with the police department and doing a lot of undercover work for many, many years. Not in my resumé, but it will never be there.

CANCEL: So how did you transition from education and criminal justice to your non-profit work?

ROSARIO: Well, you know, it comes in a circle. The things that you see working 00:07:00in the criminal justice system, a lot of youth in trouble, a lot of great minds but doing things, being in places at the wrong time sometimes, not having someone that can guide them. It kind of brings you back to education. So, the rest of the career that I've had is mainly in non-profit and helping people because the education part of it, you have to go and educate people in many ways, not necessarily in a classroom but educate the public, educate the families, how to deal with different situations and their parents and that's how I got involved. As years went by, I think that's how I saw that that was a passion of mine.

CANCEL: Did you know about the Chicano movement going on in the US when you were in Puerto Rico?

ROSARIO: I knew a little bit about it. I read somewhat about it. I wasn't too involved. I think I learned more when I started working, actually here in the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. That's when I really heard a lot about the Chicano movement.

CANCEL: Were you a part of any Puerto Rican movement for independence or statehood?

ROSARIO: Not necessarily, but in Puerto Rico there were, when I was in college, there was a lot of groups that I wasn't really activist because of the fact that, while I was in college, I was doing undercover work and that's how I started. So, it took me ten years to get my degree. I graduated in 1976 from 00:09:00high school and my degree, I got it in 1986. It was because of that. A lot of my work that I was doing and the movements that were happening in Puerto Rico with college students were stuff that I had to look from the outside because of my work with the Justice Department. So I couldn't get too much involved with them because it would interfere with what I was doing as my job, but not necessarily that I was involved hands-on in the movement.

CANCEL: So Judith, can you explain to us your role in the Latina Civil Rights?

ROSARIO: Wow. My role in Latina Civil Rights. I think part of my role has been 00:10:00basically making sure that the youth that I've worked with have the understanding that they have a voice and some rights. To give them the opportunity to have that voice heard. Once I started working here in the United States, especially with youth and in the university, there's a lot of immigrants that come, want to have a better life here but they're afraid because their parents have told them: "Chico, mija, be careful, you need to speak the language. You can't speak Spanish." And I said, you know what, speaking Spanish won't do anything by losing your rights. You need to make sure you learn the 00:11:00language but also don't lose your native language. That's one. Two, I basically told the students, get involved with whatever you think is your passion. Get involved. Try to do as much as you can and always voice your opinion. It doesn't matter what. It's not going to get you into trouble unless you do something illegal but it's a matter of making sure. . . My passion is that you have to give the opportunity to the youth to get out there, to reach for the highest place that they can reach for and go for their goals. So, I think my role hasn't been out there doing protests or anything like that but basically in the back teaching the youth, you know, that you have a voice. Don't forget to voice that 00:12:00and reach for whatever you want to because you can do anything you want. That has been, I guess, my passion. Making sure that kids and young adults know that.

CANCEL: Can you tell us how you got involved with the Urban League in Schools of Hope?

ROSARIO: Oh wow. Well, I moved to Madison. In '98, my partner and I decided to move back to Puerto Rico. My father fell ill, and they were moving back to Puerto Rico, and I said, if I

move to Puerto Rico, I've been moonlighting with opening a restaurant. And we did. We opened a restaurant in a small end in Puerto Rico and then my father passed away. My mom wanted to come back to the States. And we wanted to come back to Wisconsin, or somewhere familiar, so we decided to apply to three 00:13:00states. We said the East Coast, Michigan, where my sister was living in at the time, or back to Wisconsin and we had decided, wherever we find the first job that we think is what we want, that's where we will move. And my partner got an opportunity back here in Milwaukee, actually in Madison, and then I applied. I was working actually, I applied for a position with Madison College which was MATC at the time. So I was working there for a little bit, but it was a temporary job and then I saw the position for the Coordinator for Youth and it said Centro Hispano, Dane County. So, I went online and Googled it and it gave me the information and I said, "Woah, this is something I really would like." So, it was interesting enough because when I called, they answered as Urban 00:14:00League of Greater Madison and I'm like, "What is this all about?" I said, "I thought I was calling Centro Hispano." She says, "Well, what are you calling about?" And I said, well, this position. . . "Oh yeah, it's a joint position with the Urban League and Centro Hispano." And they put me on hold, someone explained what it was. And I said, "Hey, I'm still interested." So, I went and applied, and the position was a position that was created with a partnership with the Urban League of Greater Madison, Centro Hispano, the school district, MSCR, Madison School Community and Recreation, and the sponsors: United Way, the county, and the city. It was overseeing all of the youth programs for Urban League and Centro Hispano. What was happening was Schools of Hope had done the elementary portion of it. They started to do the middle portion of it, of 00:15:00Schools of Hope, and they saw that Centro Hispano and the Urban League were overlapping a lot of the similar. . . They wanted not so much duplication of services because the funders were funding all of those. So that's how I started with Schools of Hope. So I ran the Schools of Hope elementary plus all the youth programs here at Centro. And I started that in 2004, I believe. So that evolved from probably me doing. . . I started with eight schools here in Madison. When I left in 2010, we left twenty-five schools and five districts that Schools of Hope were involved in. But we started in middle school, ended up with middle and high school. Now there's Schools of Hope elementary, middle, and high school. So that's how I got involved with the Urban League. How things evolved, I ended up now back at Centro because after I came back from Indianapolis.

CANCEL: Can you describe your leadership roles in the Urban League and possible struggles you may have encountered?

ROSARIO: My leadership role was I was one of the administrators there. I started as the manager, became the Director of Youth Programs because it wasn't just Schools of Hope, then it was all the youth programs for Urban League and Centro Hispano. And it was pretty interesting. I think my major struggle with being an administrator in the Urban League, because I was employed by them, Centro would reimburse a portion of my salary to them to do their coordination here, was that I was the only Latina at the Urban League. The Urban League at the time went through three transitions of executive directors while I was there. So, they were in

kind of a little struggle, but you know, the staff just kept rolling and doing what they needed to do, and we all were there. But it was a little bit difficult because basically the top administrators were all men, and I was one of the few women. So that was a little struggle but, you know, they respected me, I made myself be respected and the partnerships in the community respected my work and I proved myself and we went on.

CANCEL: Were there any specific instances of discrimination because you were a woman?

ROSARIO: I won't say that I can pinpoint something but there was always underlining situations that you can tell that if it would've been-- but at one time, I basically went directly to the Executive

Director and I said, "You hired me to do something. If you want me to do it, I'll do it. If not, I can just walk out the door. You need to let me do my job. Bottom line" And he said, "You're right." And I said it right in front of my direct supervisor. He was one of the VPs and I said, "I don't like to micromanage, and I don't like to be micromanaged. If you want me to do my job, I'll do my job. If you hired me to do this, this is what I'm going to do. Otherwise, you tell me if you want me to do something else, then maybe you need to find someone else." And he said, "No, we hired you to do this, and you can continue to do your job." And I said, "Okay, great. We're all on the same page."

CANCEL: Perfect. Why did you choose to transition from Urban League of Greater Madison to United Way of Central Indiana?

ROSARIO: Well, that was. . . My partner had to relocate because of work. Actually, so, I left this job and went to Indianapolis and when I gave my resignation here, little known to me, United Way from here, from Dane County, one of the executives here called United Way in Central Indiana and said, "This person is moving down there. If you don't go and hire her, you got something else coming." Basically, they really did a very nice recommendation and I remember just before leaving, I was packing up my brand new office here in the 00:20:00brand new building from the Urban League and I had said, "Wow. I finally got a corner office and I'm leaving." And I got a call from one of the

VPs in United Way in Central Indiana and said, "When will you be in Indiana, that we could talk to you?" And I told them and so, when we moved to Indianapolis, I remember it was I believe June, the beginning of June, and by the first of July, I was already working with United Way of Central Indiana running very similar programs to Schools of Hope but over there it was called Read Up. It was a tutoring program that the United Way ran over there. My background here with Schools of Hope basically helped me get that job and my good reference from United Way.

CANCEL: How did you advance the Latino agenda while working for the Read Up program?

ROSARIO: Wow. Yeah. One of the things I immediately did, when we assessed the population of Indianapolis, it was mainly African-American but there's a lot of Latinos out there and a lot of Latinos in poverty. United Way is all about addressing the needs of the community, so we started talking about we need to hire, or we need to get volunteers of color and get volunteers that speak

the language to help these kids. There were a lot of ESL students there that were in need. I made it my point to start recruiting Latino volunteers. Different from here in Madison, the majority of the volunteers for Schools of 00:22:00Hope and the youth programs that we get are college students from the University, Edgewood, or MATC. Over there, it's a lot of community-based volunteers. And their base was based on because United Way ran that program. It wasn't like here, Centro and the Urban League ran these programs. So they were using their own volunteers. I started working with the universities IU [Indiana University] and then. . . Oh my god, Butler University, a bunch of these universities. Went to the student organizations and recruited Latino students. Because at United Way they also have a lot of other agendas, especially for families, we worked with a couple of other co-workers that were Hispanics. I 00:23:00think there were two of us at the beginning at United Way, me and another woman that was in campaign and marketing. She had a lot of connections because she had worked with United Way for the longest time so I started hitting on her and her connections out in the community and the leaders in the community. I got involved with what was called Project Stepping Stone, which is a project that is very similar to a program we have here now in Centro, but it was statewide. It was for high school students to learn their initial ways to get into the working force. Taught them all sorts of things. Project Stepping Stone was all about 00:24:00Latinos within large corporations and being mentors. I got involved with that. I volunteered with that. I also volunteered for another program that did mainly scholarships for Latino students in the Indianapolis area. I kind of had got United Way involved with those organizations because they wanted to make sure they serve the Latino community because it was growing tremendously. So that's how I kind of got a movement going with United Way which has, compared to here in Dane County, I mean, the city in Central Indiana is, I don't know, four times bigger in population. When United Way over there basically raises anywhere 00:25:00between thirty-five and forty-five million a year while we here, it's like maybe ten, fifteen [million]. It's a great organization and they have a lot of pull in the community.

CANCEL: What drew you back to Madison's Centro Hispanos specifically?

ROSARIO: Okay. Well, while I was working down there, I got a phone call from the executive director here who I have worked with while I was here. He was the deputy director, was my direct supervisor here and said, this position is being created back again. We have not had a deputy director since I was deputy director and we want to open it again. And are you interested? I said, "Well, talk to me about it, what is needed, and send me some information." So he did 00:26:00and I applied and I came back. We wanted to come back to Madison really badly because although my work in Indianapolis I enjoyed a lot, the city was very different. It was a struggle to fit in. It was a large city. It was different from Madison. Madison is smaller, and a lot of people know each other. It was kind of, I don't know-- I think things fell into place because then my partner started working back from home and this call came and I said, "Well? Are you able to then work from home from back from Madison?" And we said, ok, let's see if that possible. When we found out it was possible, I said, "Okay, I'll apply."

CANCEL: It was perfect timing, then.

ROSARIO: I know, it was. . . You know, "God said".

CANCEL: Can you describe your role as Interim Executive Director of Centro?

ROSARIO: Wow. Do it all, make it happen, and keep everyone together. It's been interesting. The transition was pretty smooth. I came as a deputy director. I was doing a lot of the stuff that I'm currently doing. And basically in an organization like Centro that has a lot of troubleshooting on a regular basis, 00:28:00that's my role here, making sure everything runs smoothly and just troubleshooting on the day to days and helping the community as best you can. I think you guys saw it this morning. I was at the front desk helping out a gentleman that had some trouble and didn't know what to do but I'm hoping I convinced him to do the right thing because. . . But yeah, I think my role is making sure to continue to partner with our agency partners out in the community and our other partners in the community, making sure that the programs run smoothly, and work with our staff, which is a small staff. We're like a family and just making sure that everyone is doing what they need to be doing at the time to serve our community. It's really interesting because it's very demanding but it's very fulfilling. It is very fulfilling.

CANCEL: How did you advance the Puerto Rican community in your work through non-profit and community activism?

ROSARIO: How do I advance?

CANCEL: Yes.

ROSARIO: You know, in the perfect world, I'm hoping that, not only here in Madison, but everywhere that within the Latino community we can be more united because sometimes you see this struggle with the different Latino communities. And it's been interesting because I've learned about the Bolivians here. I've learned about the Mexicans. I've learned about, there's a great group of Peruvian-Americans here, Colombian-Americans here, and then Puerto Ricans.

Sometimes within the community, there's struggles within each other, but it seems like in all sense, people do come together, not only when there's trouble, but when there's the need. I put out a call because I want to start a Latino mentoring program with Centro and so far, everyone has said, "Count me in." Not only the Mexicans, but the Peruvians, but the Puertoriqueños, everyone. Everyone says yes, so I think making sure that when people identify, I don't know, I guess we have this accent, or I have this accent, and I start talking to a Latino, they say, "Tu erespuertorriqueña." And I say, "Yeah." They're like, "Oh, wow." So, they light up and we start talking about Puerto Rico, whatever. 00:31:00Or another Latino from another immediately asked me, "¿Usted es de Puerto Rico, verdad?" And I'm like, "Yeah, si, de Puerto Rico. ¿Como sabe?" "Pues, su acento, y como habla y todo..." So I don't find it advancing my Puerto Rican-ness to whatever but I think it's advancing our Latino struggles to serve our Latino communities. Those of us who have the honor

and privilege to be in roles that can be leaders in the community, making sure that we serve those that are not as privileged as us and that don't have the 00:32:00voice. To me it doesn't matter where you come from, what color of your skin you are, or what heritage you are. It's a matter of helping each other. And I learned that from my father who had a third-grade education. My father, like I said, worked in factories all his life and when we moved back to Puerto Rico, he used to go out in the fincas of either my parents or my families or some friends that invited him and he used to bring us stuff like fruits and vegetables and whatnot and come back home and put it near the house and whatnot and called every neighbor and said, "I have all this stuff here. Come and get it." To the point at times, I think my mom said, "You went and harvested whatever, trajiste this and that and whatnot, and you forgot to leave some for the house. You gave 00:33:00it away." And she goes, "Oh, don't worry about it, we'll make do. Whatever." And we were not poor, poor but we weren't. . . And that's how my father was. My father thought about all his neighbors, all the friends around the community that needed and then he says, "Don't worry. Mañana yo traigo algo para nosotros. I'll bring something for us for tomorrow." And I remember when he comes with a sack of oranges or bananas or whatever and distributed it among the neighbors and then forget to leave some for home and my mom was like, "¿Que pasa?" But she was the same. She was exactly the same. My mom used to cook every Sunday for everyone in the neighborhood. She used to go to church, come back and do all these big pots of rices and whatever until one day she says, "You know, mija, I'm tired. I'm not going to cook this Sunday. Can we go out?" I'm like, 00:34:00"Sure, mom. I don't know why you cook." There was only three of us at the house. I mean, she cooked all these meals. She would do that every single Sunday, and everyone would come and eat at our house.

CANCEL: That's beautiful. So, Judith, how do you define community activism?

ROSARIO: I think community activism, it can be done in many ways. It doesn't always have to be marching down the streets with a sign. I think it's talking to families, talking to people that need it and actually doing something for those that need. I've always said, there's a saying in Spanish: "Perro que ladra no muerde." You can talk a lot but if you don't do actions, there's nothing. You have to do your actions. You have to do what needs to be done for those that need. I'll tell you a story that I really barely say. I was on vacation in 00:35:00Puerto Rico once and we were coming and in the airplane there was a young couple sitting across. And this was years ago, we were living in Milwaukee. With a young child and the baby was crying and crying, so I knew they weren't speaking the language, English, because they were speaking Spanish the whole time and I said, "¿Necesitan leche o algo para bebe?" And they said, "Si, pero no traje." So I told the stewardess and they gave them. And then we started a conversation. "Where you going?" They were coming to Wisconsin. We were living in Milwaukee. And so the young girl took out a paper and showed me, this is where we're going. They were going up to Green Bay, I believe it was. And I'm like, "So you have family there?" "We have some friends there and we're moving there because they might find us a job" and blah blah blah and I'm like, okay. And I go, "Alright, 00:36:00have you ever been there?" "No, but we're looking for better opportunities. . ." So, we were getting there, almost landing and so she asks me again, so. . . We're landing at 11:30 at night. In Milwaukee. And she says, "How can I get a taxi to Green Bay?" And I'm like, "Oh wow, not at this time of night. You might get a bus, but I don't

think there's anything from Milwaukee to Green Bay at this time." They looked at each other and he says, "So where can we stay until we get a way to get up there for tomorrow?" And I'm like, "Well, are you guys--" I said, "I don't know about getting a hotel at this night, do you guys have money enough to. . .?" And it 00:37:00broke my heart, they said, "Well, we got about two hundred dollars." I'm like, oh my god. So I said to my partner, I said, "You know what, they're going to stay at our house tonight." And she said, "Yeah, that's fine." So I looked at her and said, "¿Se quieren quedar con nosotros esta noche?" They looked at each other and they didn't believe. I mean, it was eleven at night with a kid, 11:30 at night, where were they going to go? So we took them in. They were scared because they didn't know these two women, where are they going to take us, whatever. So they stayed overnight, I called a friend of mine, and I said, "Can you accompany tomorrow me to take these folks to Green Bay?" We took the trip up from Milwaukee. I brought them to Green Bay and took them to their friend's house. They wanted to give me money, but I mean, c'mon. You got two hundred dollars, you just moved from Puerto Rico with a baby. No. But that is activism. 00:38:00That is putting your money where your mouth is. That is what you do for your fellow people. It's not so much getting on a horn and saying, protesting. Yeah, that's good once in a while but you have to do actions. I don't say that story because to. . . But I say that story because it is something we do need to do.

CANCEL: Judith, what is the most impactful work you've done and why?

ROSARIO: I think it's been the work with youth. The work I did in Milwaukee, in college, the work that I've done here in Madison with Schools of Hope and the youth, the work that I'm doing currently with Centro. It brings you full-circle. I tell some of the students, "You know, I wish I had the opportunities you have right now from school and what not than when I was growing up." Because, you 00:39:00know, from the Escalera program that we have here that mentors kids here and shows them the different opportunities of work out there and to help them write a resume for the first time, do internships that we have right now. Things like that. I didn't have that when I was growing up. I had my family as mentors, my parents, my uncles, and aunts but the opportunities in the schools, they were very little. So, I think that the work that we're doing now I think has been very fulfilling to me and very to my heart because it's what we need to do. It's what's needed.

CANCEL: How would you identify yourself? Latina? Boricua? Feminist?

ROSARIO: Three. I am a Latina, una Boricua, and I am a feminist. Yes.

CANCEL: Do you have any words of advice to future activists? Generations?

ROSARIO: Be true to yourself and what you believe. Put your words into action. Don't say you're going to be doing things or you believe in something but don't do things for the community. Your actions speak louder than anything that you might say. You don't have to be out there being on TV, being on radio, [inaudible], it's what you do for the community that possibly no one knows. The

help that you do for your fellow Chicano, Puertoriqueños, whoever. 00:41:00African-American, white, anyone. They're your fellow people. You have to do better by for people. A lot of my friends say, "You have all of this education and experience. Why are you always working in non- profit?" I don't know. It feels right. That is what makes me happy. Not having a million dollars in my pocket. I think I would never be rich because I'd probably give it all away. I won the lottery in Puerto Rico once and I gave it all away.

CANCEL: Well, thank you so much for this interview.

ROSARIO: You're welcome, thank you.