ABSTRACT
Our decision to use autoethnography (Ellis & Bochner, woo) as a method of producing stories, or cuentos, was based on the assumption that linking personal experiences to cultural context would generate a deeper understanding of what it means to serve the public good. We were right in the narrow sense of that assumption. What we learned, however, was that the cuentos presented in this book offered much more. Beyond a deeper understanding of what it means to serve the public good, each cuento provided insights into how we, as Latina/o faculty members; came to understand the public good, developed an urgency to address it, overcame barriers as we pursued it, and reclaimed estrate jias (strategies) to enhance it. In short, each cuento contributed to shaping a new model of higher education for the public good (see Figure ILI).
