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How Community Engagement and a Shift in Educational Focus is Changing Lives

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How Community Engagement and a Shift in Educational Focus is Changing Lives

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In this video, Juan talks about the "ingredients" they use at Instituto to keep students motivated, an educational program that gets right to the heart of what low-income adults need to be ready for college,  and a need to shift our educational system to support upward mobility.

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Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC)

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Due to his success with Instituto del Progreso Latino, Juan is now the Chancellor of City Colleges of Chicago, whose mission echoes Juan's work at Instituto:

"City Colleges of Chicago (CCC) delivers exceptional learning opportunities and educational services for diverse student populations in Chicago...We work proactively to eliminate barriers to employment and to address and overcome casual factors underlying socio-economic disparities and inequities of access and graduation in higher education."

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Chancellor, City Colleges of Chicago

City Colleges of Chicago Chancellor Juan Salgado has focused his 20-year career on improving education and economic opportunities for residents in low-income communities.

As Chancellor, he oversees Chicago's community college system, serving more than 80,000 students across seven colleges.

From 2001 to 2017, he served as CEO of Instituto del Progreso Latino, where he worked to empower residents of Chicago's Southwest Side through education, citizenship, and skill-building programs that led to sustainable employment and economic stability.

Chancellor Salgado is a community college graduate himself, earning an associate degree from Moraine Valley Community College, prior to earning a Bachelors degree from Illinois Wesleyan University, and a Masters degree in Urban Planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Chancellor Salgado has been nationally recognized for his work, most recently as a 2015 MacArthur Fellow, one of the most prestigious innovation prizes in the United States.

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Chancellor, City Colleges of Chicago

City Colleges of Chicago Chancellor Juan Salgado has focused his 20-year career on improving education and economic opportunities for residents in low-income communities. Since 2001, he has served as CEO of Instituto del Progreso Latino, where he worked to empower residents of Chicago's Southwest Side through education, citizenship, and skill-building programs that led to sustainable employment and economic stability. On May 1, 2017, he begins a new role as Chancellor of City Colleges of Chicago, the city's community college system, serving more than 90,000 students across seven colleges. Chancellor Salgado is a community college graduate himself, earning an associate degree from Moraine Valley Community College, prior to earning a Bachelors degree from Illinois Wesleyan University, and a Masters degree in Urban Planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Chancellor Salgado has been nationally recognized for his work, most recently as a 2015 recipient of the "MacArthur Genius" award, one of the most prestigious innovation prizes in the United States. He is a former president of the board of the Illinois Coalition of Immigration and Refugee Rights, a New Americans Campaign partner organization.​​

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City Colleges of Chicago Chancellor Juan Salgado

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Chancellor, City Colleges of Chicago City Colleges of Chicago Chancellor Juan Salgado has focused his 20-year career on improving education and economic opportunities for residents in low-income communities. As Chancellor, he oversees Chicago's community college system, serving more than 80,000 students across seven colleges.

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1) Creative people often work on a variety of projects that can be interconnected.
2) Creativity requires the creation of a product that is novel and appropriate/useful.
3) Creative people are risk-takers who have the courage to create change.

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"Every human being has a capacity to achieve their own greatness, and so, it's my responsibility. I've taken it on - to make sure that that happens for the people that I can actually touch..." Juan Salgado
This video gives an overview of Juan's vision and work at Instituto.

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Community Leader Juan Salgado, 2015 MacArthur Fellow

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3) Juan has the courage to create because of his belief in the power and value of eduction and his desire to address perpetual poverty. 

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3) Juan has the courage to create because of his belief in the power and value of eduction and his desire to address perpetual poverty. 

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"The courage to create, it seemed, often came not from looking within but from looking outside themselves, from relying on something perceived as distinctly larger than their own tiny vulnerable beings...the external source of strength could be characterized as a belief in a set of values that gave her the confidence to make decisions" (Shekerjian, 1990, p. 25).

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Community leader in Chicago

CEO of Instituto del Progreso (2001-2017)

MacArthur Fellow 2015

Referred to as a "visionary"  in school leadership

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The Instituto del Progreso Latino combines education services and counseling services to address many needs:

adult basic education

language instruction

job skills

career coaching

financial coaching

income support coaches

counseling for other obstacles (transportation, child care, and elder care)

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Creating a model for workforce development and training among immigrant communities through a holistic approach that addresses language skills, education, and other barriers to entering the workforce.

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Creating a model for workforce development and training among immigrant communities through a holistic approach that addresses language skills, education, and other barriers to entering the workforce.

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B.A. in Economics

Masters in Urban Planning

President of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (2001-2011)

CEO of Instituto del Progreso Latino (2001-2017)

Chancellor, City Colleges of Chicago

All of Juan's experiences/areas of study/work involve his passion for immigration issues, but allow him to approach the topic from different perspectives. Instituto del Progreso Latino addresses a complex web of obstacles faced by immigrants living in poverty instead of focusing on one aspect while ignoring other factors.

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Juan Salgado is the president and CEO of Instituto del Progreso Latino , a Chicago nonprofit organization which contributes to the development of Latino immigrants through education, training, and employment programs that engage the whole family and are accessible to people of all skill levels. Since 2001, Salgado has led Instituto through a period of national award-winning recognition and historic organizational growth, establishing national best-practice educational and workforce models. In 2011 the White House recognized him as one of thirteen Champions of Change who were honored for social innovation in their communities. He was selected to join the MacArthur Fellows class of 2015 for his strong community leadership and innovative approach to education in the Latino immigrant community.
On May 26, 2016, Salgado spoke on a panel for this year's Chicago Interfaith Gathering titled "2016 Presidential Election: The Effects of Political Rhetoric on Minority Communities ," which was hosted by the Niagara Foundation and the International House Global Voices Lecture Series. Gate writer and Global Voices Metcalf intern Maya Ruíz sat down with him before the event to learn more about his work.

The Gate: Can you tell me about your work at Instituto del Progreso Latino? I'd really like to know what it took to build that amazing team.

Juan Salgado: I love that fact that you asked about creating the team, because when you're doing human development, when you're working with people, when you want to see those people be everything they can be, it really is about the people that are helping them. It's about the human beings around them, it's about the teachers, it's about the approach. And I think in many ways, our team is full of folks who have been through the experience. Dr. Ricardo Estrada , for instance, is Colombian but came to the United States. He had to learn the English language, but dreamed of getting his Ph.D. He had to go through the system of education here, and in the process of being a part of it as an adult, he started to gain an interest in how he could help others. It's people like him, who have gone through this, who form the base of our organization, who are, quite frankly, frustrated with the existing systems of education that aren't working. So one, they've been through it themselves.

Two, they've been at other institutions that either don't believe in our students-don't know how to approach our students and really draw the best out of them-or don't create the space for creativity. I'm not an educator. I'm an urban planner. But I run an education institution, and the way I'm able to do that is just by creating an environment. You create an environment with that kind of talent, [people] who can actually dream and achieve their dreams and do creative things. So the creative part of the organization actually isn't me. I'm the leadership part of the organization, so I just create the space for people to be creative. And there's a lot of those kinds of people in the world. They just end up in places that don't believe in them, that don't necessarily believe in our students, so we create that environment where they can really flourish-both our staff and our students.

Gate: That's very exciting work. Like you said, a lot of these people come to Instituto and the people who work there are coming from experiences where they weren't supported in the educational systems that exist. Do you think that your model can be transferred over to public schools or to universities? Do you think that it's possible for this to be accessible to everyone, not just through nonprofits?

Salgado: Yeah, that's a great question. There are things that we're doing technically that are a little different than what the system was doing before and it's getting much better results than what a community college is getting. We're doing some things technically different in our high schools too. That part of it I think is completely transferable-how we push the curriculum, the cohorts, the supports for families. So there are some things that I think, if you do them, they can be replicated.

The one thing that really requires culture change is how you view the human being. If I see a fourth-grade reader with broken English, and I can't really see the bachelor's degree nurse in them that's not too far away on the horizon, then all the technical stuff in the world isn't going to get them there. And so the cultures at these institutions have to be such. And I'm not talking about teachers; the culture is driven by the leadership and the approach of the institution. And so the answer is yes, [replication] can happen, but it requires leadership that's enlightened and leadership that's driving down a belief in human beings. If you've got a kid who's acting out, who is screaming for help-what I mean by screaming for help is that they're saying and doing all these things that are counterproductive and yet they're screaming for help-if you can figure out how to help them, they're college material. But if you can't see the college material-if you just see the hoodie, you know, the raw anger and frustration and despair-then that's all you can see, and it doesn't matter what technical stuff you have. You won't get that student to really flourish. That's not a straight answer, but it's my answer.

Gate: This conference is about the effects of political rhetoric on minority communities. How do you see your work as changing the way we see each other in the larger Chicago community, or even on a national level?
The image featured in this article is licensed under Creative Commons. The original image can be found here.
Salgado: So there are a lot of things we can do to build a more cohesive community. It means our leadership, where we spend our time. During the day, I have to run an organization that delivers results. But on my free time there are things that I can do. There are lots of things that I can do. For ten years, I was the president of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights , [which is made up of] 130 different organizations-I stopped in 2011, because after ten years, that's enough! Somebody else needs to do it. But an organization of 130 different ethnic communities, bringing together the Latino community, the Chinese community, the Polish community, the Muslim community, the African immigrant community, and just getting to that point where we not only know each other, but can support each other. Shortly after 9/11, we created a campaign that brought Latinos and Muslims together so that Latinos could really understand and not fall prey to the rhetoric that was going on with regards to Muslims. When you do things like that, you start to change mindsets. It becomes not so easy for our community to get caught up in the wrong narrative, but it also creates strength so that we can push for the right narrative. We need both: we need our community wise enough to not fall prey, but we need our community strong enough to propel through the wrong narrative that pops up in our country every once in awhile. It just doesn't seem to go away!

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. This interview was made possible by the Gate' s partnership with the Global Voices Interview Series and can also be found on the Global Voices website

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Space for Creativity: An Interview with Juan Salgado

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Juan Salgado is the president and CEO of Instituto del Progreso Latino , a Chicago nonprofit organization which contributes to the development of Latino immigrants through education, training, and employment programs that engage the whole family and are accessible to people of all skill levels.

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1) Juan has worked on many interrelated projects. 

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1) Juan has worked on many interrelated projects. 

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"This interrelationship of projects seems to be typical of creative activity. The exploration of an interlocking network of enterprises revolving around one specific activity allows the researcher to look at the problem from lots of different angles" (Shekerjian, 1990, p. 9-10).

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2) Juan's work has led to the creation of a program that is novel and useful. 

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2) Juan's work has led to the creation of a program that is novel and useful. 

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"To be considered creative, a product or response must be novel...and appropriate" (Hennesseey & Amabile, 1988).