[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 132 (Wednesday, October 9, 2002)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1808]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         RECOGNIZING ACHIEVEMENTS AND LIFE OF DR. ROBERTO CRUZ

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. ZOE LOFGREN

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Wednesday, October 9, 2002

  Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Speaker, today, I rise to recognize the achievements 
and life of Dr. Roberto Cruz, founder and first President of the 
National Hispanic University (NHU) in San Jose, California. I am proud 
to have known Dr. Cruz for over 20 years, and have seen first hand 
tireless work to establish and expand NHU, one of only three Hispanic 
universities in the nation, and the only one west of Chicago.
  Born and raised in Corpus Christi, Texas, Dr. Cruz received his 
bachelor's degree from Wichita State University in 1964 thanks to a 
football scholarship. A star middle linebacker and center, Dr. Cruz 
passed on opportunities to play football professionally in order to 
teach junior high school in Stockton California.
  Seeing the need to improve the educational system, he went on to earn 
his doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley in 1971. 
That same year, he established the Bay Area Bilingual Education League 
(BABEL), a consortium of schools and educational institutions 
developing bilingual education for students in Oakland and Berkeley. by 
1976 he was an education professor at Stanford University, where he was 
appalled at how few Latinos enrolled at colleges.
  In 1981, Dr. Cruz and a group of loyal supporters established The 
National Hispanic University in a two-room building in Oakland, 
California. The goal was to address the learning needs of Hispanics and 
other minorities, especially non-native English speakers. Over the last 
20 years, he has built NHU into a quality, accredited, private four-
year university for all.
  In the few weeks before he passed away on September 4, San Jose's 
planning commission approved his ambitious proposal to transform the 
private college, housed in an old elementary school, into a three-
story, $18 million full-fledged university campus.
  A few weeks earlier, NHU made history by becoming the first Hispanic 
four-year university to be accredited by the prestigious Western 
Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), an organization that only 
accredits 155 colleges and universities from among 3,000 institutions 
in the region. With this accreditation NHU joins Stanford and the 
University of California as a nationally and regionally accredited and 
recognized institution.
  Dr. Roberto Cruz left us a legacy of young people who have a future 
because, through the power of education, he let them have one.
  He proved that Si se puede!

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