Blanca E. Vega

A native New Yorker, Blanca E. Vega is the daughter of Ecuadorian immigrants. Blanca is Assistant Professor of Higher Education at Montclair State University. She earned a Ed.D. from the Higher and Postsecondary Education program at Teachers College, Columbia University. During that time, she also worked as Director of the Higher Education Opportunity Program (HEOP) at Marymount Manhattan College. She earned a B.A. in Anthropology from Brandeis University and a M.A. in Higher Education at New York University. Blanca's scholarship broadly focuses on equity, access, and success in higher education among underserved populations. Her primary area of research situates racism as one of multiple barriers that can impact higher education experiences and success – not just for students, but also for administrators and faculty. She is currently studying perceptions of racial incidents in higher education and organizational responses to these incidents. Her secondary area of research explores leadership and policymaking and their impact on access to and support for undocumented students. In this line of inquiry, Blanca examines leadership concerning undocumented students in an increasingly anti-immigrant political environment. Finally, she continues to explore Latinx intellectualism in higher education curriculum, instruction, and the professoriate.