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- Title:
- Sara Contreras interview
- Interviewee:
- Contreras, Sara
- Interviewer:
- Hua, Joan, 1989-
- Date Created:
- 2019-10-30
- Role:
- Staff; Student
- Department:
- Education; CEI
- Subjects:
- Education Program College of Education classroom teachers recruitment community outreach Center for Equity and Inclusion Diversity Resource Center student parent student services
- Biography:
- Sara Contreras (b. 1955) is currently a program administrator at the UW Tacoma Center for Equity and Inclusion. In the early 1990s, she worked to help establish University of Washington Tacoma’s Education Program (which became the School of Education in 2016) and has since played a key role in the program’s development—working to support students needs and recruitment—until 2008. She grew up in Morgan Hill, California, where she gained prior work experiences in the Morgan Hill Unified School District. When she moved to Seattle in the early 1980s, she worked at the College of Education at UW Seattle, where she simultaneously began college coursework. She finished and earned her bachelor’s degree at UW Tacoma in 1995.
- Description:
- In this interview, Sara Contreras discusses her experience working as a founding staff member to establish the Education Program (later the School of Education) at University of Washington Tacoma in 1992. She also reflects on her experience earning her bachelor’s degree at UW Tacoma as a working student and student parent. The session begins with her trajectory starting her career in the Morgan Hill Unified School District in Morgan Hill, California, and later at the College of Education at UW Seattle, before working and completing her degree at UW Tacoma. Contreras mentions faculty colleagues such as Marcy Stein and Belinda Louie who shared her path moving from the UW College of Education to UW Tacoma. She points to a strong sense of comradery when staff from different academic programs worked closely alongside each other in the small quarters of the Perkins Building, where the university operated until 1997. As the sole staff member of the Education Program when it was first established, Contreras had a wide array of responsibilities. She discusses working at outreach and recruiting events, interfacing with educators in the community, and her sense of pride and belonging in the Education Program. She recalls working with students—majority female and professional teachers—to navigate the challenges negotiating between graduate school, personal life, and teaching. In the later part of the interview, Contreras reflects on periods of growth and distress during her time at UW Tacoma, which corresponded with the different seasons in the university’s history. She emphasizes the priority to serve students and help them succeed, which she says is the most rewarding aspect of her work at UW Tacoma.
- Location:
- United States--Washington (State)--Tacoma United States--Washington (State)--Seattle United States--Washington (State)--Federal Way United States--California--Morgan Hill
- Type:
- Sound; Text; StillImage
- Format:
- cpd
- Preferred Citation:
- University of Washington Libraries, University of Washington Tacoma Library, UWTOH201901