In honor of 50 years of coeducation at Albuquerque Academy, 校友 Council member Ted Alcorn ’01 is telling the stories of women alumni.
When 15-year-old Loretta Cordova arrived at the Academy in 1974, she was no stranger to the place. 她爸爸, 文森特·科尔多瓦, taught math here 和 was one of the basketball 和 track coaches, so on weekends she 和 her siblings spent time on campus attending sporting events or swimming in the pool. “It was our playground,”她说。.
这所学校, 然而, didn’t know what to do with her or her female peers, part of the second coed class it had enrolled. “I don’t know that they were really prepared,”她说。. At first there was no girls’ locker room, 和, as she recalled it, the only girls’ bathroom was for staff 和 located in the administrative building. Some teachers’ mindsets needed an update, 太, 洛雷塔说, recalling remarks about the need to “lower st和ards” for female students in the classroom 和 on the athletic field.
Born into a Hispanic family that had been in New Mexico for hundreds of years, the inequities of the world were plain to Loretta at an early age. But she also saw that with grit 和 effort she could overcome some of them 和 make it easier for others to follow. A major influence was her sister with Down Syndrome, 谁 navigated a world that often lacks compassion 和 respect for people 谁 are different. “I watched the incredible adversity that my sister faced but also the incredible work that my parents did to advance the needs of children like my sister.”
Loretta was fortunate to benefit from the tuition discount offered to Academy teachers. In return, like all students 谁 received scholarships at the time, Loretta had to work on campus. “I would be washing the windows in the pool 和 in the cafeteria washing dishes while other students were out playing,她回忆道。. What might have been stigmatizing became a source of strength; she grew close with the kitchen crew 和 groundskeepers, 谁, 反过来, 太k special pride in the educational path she was blazing.
The first time she ever flew in an airplane was to visit colleges in California, 和 she wound up at Stanford, graduating in 1981 with a degree in human biology 和 Spanish. Then she returned to the University of New Mexico medical school, one of only a few Hispanic women in the class of 75 students. She went on to specialize in pediatrics 和 became particularly adept at treating Spanish-speaking patients 和 children with special health needs.
Times have changed. At UNM where she was once a student, she’s now a leader. In 2006 she became the first Hispanic female in the country to chair a Department of Pediatrics, where she teaches students 和 oversees a staff of over 700. These days, she has more women students than men. Pediatrics is the lowest-paid specialty in medicine but, particularly in a state that ranks near the bottom on child well-being, one of the most important.
Loretta is pleased to see that the Academy also grew more diverse by the time her oldest daughter enrolled in 2002, followed by her three younger children. “I don’t think they saw or experienced as much of what I did,”她说。. She credited her dad, 谁 started the Academy’s Multicultural Summer Honors Program to recruit more students from disadvantaged communities in Albuquerque 和 around the state.
Loretta has always embraced her Hispanic heritage. Birthday parties are occasions for family to gather 和 enjoy traditional food 和 music. She returns to the small agrarian communities where her parents grew up for fiestas 和 other occasions, although she doesn’t make it as often as she would like. “When I first started in medicine, I never expressed my Hispanic pride,”她说。, but now she makes a special point of talking about her family’s history. “It means a lot to me.”