Academia is very rewarding and at the same time it can be difficult at times. There's a lot of demands that are placed on the faculty, doing the research, starting the research lab. Teaching, doing service, they try to protect you to some extent, but I think sometimes there might be an extra burden placed on ethnic minority academicians. Because there's not a lot of them, number wise, so you're asked either within the department or outside being involved. When I got to Lubbock, Texas, I got involved in the community, because I value that. But they also seek you out, being on executive boards for community agencies, non-profit organizations.

It's rewarding and it's challenging being an academician from an ethnic minority background. There's not a lot of us as the data suggests. It should not be a surprise to anyone. So in that sense, my framework is I see as an opportunity. It's a challenge, but I see it as an opportunity to be a voice to some extent for the underserved, for other minority faculty. And it gives me an opportunity to interact with other faculty and hopefully bring in and serve as a pipeline to other ethnic minority students.

Because I'm one of the few ethnic minority academicians in my department or university or even field. I feel this pull to try to help out as much as possible. And sometimes I get teased for it or people alert me to that. But it's something that I firmly; especially working out in the community. Again, they try to protect you as much as possible, but you also got to balance that with your own personal values of what you value in life.

And that was another reason why I ended up going into academia was that I figured at some point that I would probably have a bigger impact on the field if I went into academia and was able to serve as a mentor for other students.