Leslie Patricia Luqueño is a 6th year Ph.D. Candidate in the Graduate School of Education, specializing in Sociology of Education with a minor in Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity. She was born and raised in Bell Gardens, California and holds a B.A. in Anthropology from Haverford College and an M.A. in Sociology from Stanford University. Her research lies at the intersection of immigration, higher education, and family, with a focus on Latinx immigrant families navigating the transition to college. Her dissertation titled, “College is a Familia Occasion: How Latinx Immigrant Families Navigate the Transition toward Higher Education,” draws upon a 2-year qualitative study that follows a group of Latinx parents and students as they go through the college application process and transition into the first year of college. Utilizing her novel theoretical framework, immigrant legacies, Leslie delves into how immigration familial histories manifest and the ways in which they inform how families support each other during critical moments of educational and life change.
As a first-generation-to-college student from a working-class, Mexican immigrant family herself, Leslie is dedicated to the expansion of justice and equity within higher education and engages in research projects that will have positive impact on the communities she works with. Leslie’s work has been published in multiple journal articles and a co-authored book, and she is the recipient of various fellowships, including the CCSRE Dissertation Fellowship, the Ford Foundation Predoctoral and Dissertation Fellowships, the Diversifying Academia, Recruiting Excellence (DARE) Fellowship, and the Research, Impact, and Action through Strategic Engagement (RAISE) Fellowship.