María José Alvarez Vidana

My interest in education came from volunteering in different national and international NGOs, where I tutored students from rural and urban public schools in Mexico. Volunteering widened my perspective on education and showed me the challenges to have quality education in my country. Therefore, while I pursued my B.A. in International Relations at ITAM in México City, I took courses to better understand Mexico’s education system and public policies. In my last year as an undergraduate student, I volunteered in Mexicanos Primero, a national NGO that advocates for the right to education in Mexico. There, I strengthened my passion for education and fueled my drive to improve it. After graduating, I worked in a research center for education policies (PIPE-CIDE), where I designed, implanted, and evaluated extracurricular programs for high school and college students. These academic and work experiences led me to pursue a master’s in education to acquire the knowledge to impact the Mexican education system.

I was accepted into the International Education Policy Analysis program with the Claudio X. González Fellowship. When I arrived at Stanford, I was eager to learn more about how to create a comprehensive school that developed students in all their spheres: academic, physical, mental, and emotional. After finishing my master’s, I can say that I achieved this goal. Something great about this master’s is that I could take so many courses from the GSE and other departments to explore my interest. And so, with the wide variety of classes that The School of Education offers, I learned about quantitative and qualitative methods, program evaluation, curriculum construction, policy design and implementation, and how to lead change in schools. I believe that with all my courses, I acquired the knowledge and skills to change schools and education systems I was looking for.

The course work was complemented with my M.A. thesis. I found this work very valuable because it allowed to explore my interest while learning how to do a high-quality research paper step by step. I interviewed students from an academically demanding university in Mexico on their sources of stress and support. This was such a wonderful experience since I had the opportunity to interact with college students, which is one of my passions while improving my research skills.

Looking back on this year, I can see how much this program made me grow personally and academically. My cohort, and peers from other programs, offered their perspectives from so many different backgrounds, which opened my mind to a diversity of questions and answers. Above all, they always pushed me to be a better educator and human being. Also, the faculty was always willing to offer support, and, with their practice, they taught me different ways to educate and make changes in the education field. Now I am happy to apply my skills and knowledge to Camino 21, an education start-up that seeks to improve teaching practices in Latin-American higher education, as a learning designer. I am thankful for all the opportunities that this master’s opened up to me and for the people and experiences it gave me.