David Campos – List Their Highest Level of Education

Posted byAngela Chaidez VincentPosted inDavid Campos
List Their Highest Level of Education This is a collage of 3 different photographs. On the left is a profile photo of my father. On the right is my grandfather. In the middle is me facing forward. They are all in black and white. Each photo lists their highest level of education from left to right as follows: Highest Level of Education: Some college; what this really means is that I went to K-12 in Mexico, except for that small window of time spent in the US. I went to college there, but was too poor to continue. Too many days I went hungry because I had to choose between the pesos for the ride there and back or for food. When I went to the US looking for something else, the real education came from working in the strawberry fields and knowing that wasn’t for me. I wanted to use my mind to build. That’s how I came into construction. Once, I fell from a high ledge and was told I would never work again. I went to Fresno City College to try to learn again. But I was told I didn’t have the right transcripts to enroll. My education beyond these borders didn’t mean anything here. I returned to drywall. And spent the rest of my time building walls until my spine finally said, enough education. Highest Level of Education: Masters/Graduate degree. I said my dream job was to teach at Fresno City College. It wasn’t until years later, after having earned tenure, that I learned about my father’s rejection from the school that now employed ME. At the beginning of every semester after, I think about my father coming onto campus and attempting to enroll. I look for him in others roaming the campus and trying to find something. I learned English because assimilation was encouraged. I lost any hint of accent because of the same. I majored in English because I thought it would be able to protect me from discrimination. Like hey now, I can speak the language better than you. But it was never enough. That lesson was the hardest to learn. Highest Level of Education: Elementary. I really wanted to be a pilot. When I worked in our family ranchos I would love to see the planes flying across the sky. How great it would be to leave the land I tended and finally see the big picture. Though I must say my education really came in the form of grief. When I lost my eldest son at a very young age, it broke me. I learned grief was at the bottom of bottles. I learned the limit my family would take before they finally threatened to leave me because even the threat of losing my own life was not enough; the only doctor I ever listened too was my heart being broken when I lost him. I understood then finally that medicine was family. I left alcohol behind in hopes that my family could thrive. But it took me eating orange rinds in an alley when I first got to the US to survive. It took me years of working the fields. It took me years to finally board a plane and look out the window.

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Artist’s Statement: In the article “The Resegregation of Jefferson County,” Nikole Hannah-Jones writes that “since 2000, at least 71 communities across the country, most of them white and wealthy, have sought to break away from their public-school districts to form smaller, more exclusive ones.” This led to research into my state’s segregation and integration efforts. The rhetoric, the maps, and the data were all there—coded language, school boundaries, and even diversity statements covered the stagnant “struggle” toward integration. As an educator, this project provided context for my experience and those of the students in the classroom. Notes and citations will appear at the end of the project. 

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