Chapter 15: Professional Development Across Borders: Binational Teacher Exchanges in the New Latino Diaspora

In June of 2006, I accompanied an intrepid group of 11 Nebraska educators and their guides on a 16-day professional development journey to the western Mexican city of Guadalajara. During their stay in Mexico, I joined these in-service and preservice teachers and school support personnel in a structured program of guided school visits, meetings with Mexican educators, Spanish classes, lectures on Mexican culture and immigration, and Mexican family home stays. What compelled this group of educators from the U.S. Heartland to make this voyage to Mexico to immerse themselves in this study abroad course on Mexican schooling, culture, and language? As we will see, Nebraska, like other New Latino Diaspora states, has seen dramatic increases in its Latino population and preparing for/reacting to this shift was one rationale for the travel-study in Guadalajara.