2005 DEAN'S GRADUATE MEDALIST
COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCE
Alicia J. Rivera
M.A., History

Alicia Rivera will complete her M.A. degree with a 3.90 GPA, earned while commuting from Visalia, working full time as a nurse, and putting three children through college. A native of Costa Rica, she has worked hard to perfect her English, and has been successful, with five publications in a variety of academic journals and texts. She has made a number of presentations on her research on the history of race and the law at prestigious academic conferences including the American Historical Association Conference. Her work on the San Joaquin Valley Cotton Strike of 1933 has been accepted to the Labor Conference, which will take place at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She has been accepted in UC Santa Barbara's Ph.D. program for the fall, and has a goal of becoming a labor/racial historian.