About me

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My name is Maria Isela Maier and I grew up in a close-knit Spanish language speaking family in a small town in far west Texas located less than a mile away the U.S. Mexico border. As a minority student, attaining a higher education has always been my ultimate goal. I have always believed that education is the key to changing, not only challenging circumstances, but also a way of helping individuals achieve their academic and professional goals. For that reason, I decided to return to school after being away for 16 years and obtain a Ph.D. in Rhetoric and Composition. My choice in this field was prompted by my own experience as a non-native English speaker and my desire to help other students who are in the margins become part of the mainstream. Not being proficient in the English language, the language of the academia, can be a frustrating and daunting feat. In my studies as a doctoral student, I am exposed to scholarship that focuses on pedagogical approaches and theories aimed at empowering students to communicate effectively and make rhetorical choices that can effect change. As a current Assistant Instructor, this understanding allows me to design course material that will benefit the diverse student population entering colleges and universities. This knowledge has also helped me present research on linguistic diversity in higher education in various conferences that I have attended.

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As I continue with my education as a doctoral candidate at the University of Texas at El Paso, my desire to facilitate the communicative process for students has also driven my dissertation research interests. In fact, my dissertation topic centers on identifying students’ linguistic resources and how their home languages can aid in their writing process. My goal is to identify how and why bilingual students’ use their home languages in the classroom as they are prompted and allowed by their instructors. Learning why and how bilinguals use their linguistic repertories may lead educators to provide opportunities that enable all students to use their languages as resources in college-level contexts.