When Valeria Andrango (C ‘25) milks her family’s cows in the Andean mountains, she’s “literally in the clouds.” We’re sitting outside of La Casa in the ARCH basement, but speaking to the senior transports me to the mountains of Ecuador. When she was two years old, Valeria immigrated from Chimborazo—the highest volcano in Ecuador—to Harlem. Despite the cross–continental distance, Valeria has been intent on preserving her Kichwa Puruha ancestry and advocating for Indigenous immigrant populations.
Valeria speaks five languages: Kichwa, Spanish, English, Portuguese, and even Korean. Literacy is everything to Valeria, being the first woman to learn to read in her family. As a project coordinator in the New York Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, Valeria conducts Know Your Rights workshops for immigrants and increases accessibility by translating these programs into Kichwa and Quechua dialects.
Language is the bridge to culture, especially for Indigenous groups which have robust oral histories. When she came to college, Valeria helped revitalize Quechua at Penn. She now serves as the president of the language and culture program on campus.
Carrying her family’s Indigenous values plus what she’s learned from her diverse school in Harlem, Valeria is shaped by all the diverse spaces and communities that she’s been a part of; it’s through the knowledge that she’s gained that she bridges the gap for Indigenous immigrants, creating space for these communities where they don’t yet exist.
Name: Valeria Andrango
Hometown: Chimborazo, Ecuador
Major(s): Political Science, minor in Latin American Studies
Activities: Quechua at Penn, The Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, The Hermanas of the Glorious Gamma Chapter of Sigma Lambda Upsilon/Señoritas Latinas Unidas Sorority, Inc, Netter Center for Community Partnerships Partner, The Indigenous Latinx Project Member, Penn for Immigrant Rights Community Outreach Chair, Cipactli Latinx Honor Society, the Opportunity Network Fellow.
Where do you call home?
I call home between the Andean mountains of Ecuador and the skyscrapers of Harlem, New York City. It’s a combination of the two. I was born in Ecuador and immigrated at a very young age. We've been in Harlem ever since. I am Kichwa Puruha, so I am a part of an Indigenous community in Ecuador. My parents’ immigration story looked different than a lot of other Latino immigrants because they also carried that Indigenous identity, plus the struggles that they faced in Ecuador. It influenced the values and knowledge that they passed down to me. You don't really hear about a lot of Indigenous groups, despite New York City being one of the most diverse communities.
They went through a lot of trauma and racial violence in Ecuador because of those identities. They were in a very difficult situation where they did not know if this experience was something that they wanted to pass on to their kids. I think it made them very hesitant to kind of open that chapter up here.
What did carry on ever since we left Ecuador was the community and the family. In Kichwa we call this an ‘ayllu.’ It refers to your family. It's not always your genetic family or those who carry the same blood as you. It's really who you live in a community with and how you grow from one another. Those values I grew up with are a huge part of my immigration story, and why, to this day, I am still very committed to kind of creating these spaces of genuine support among one another.
Can you tell me about Quechua at Penn?
I remember I was scrolling through Facebook one day, and I saw a post of Nico Suárez–Guerrero, who was the first Quechua Fulbright scholar to be working at an Ivy League institution. In that moment, it sparked something in me. I had never imagined myself at an institution like the University of Pennsylvania. Seeing the Quechua Language Program established here drew me to apply.
When I got into Penn, I hit the ground running and went straight to that program. I began as the student co–pilot in 2021 under Professor Américo Mendoza–Mori. We managed to do a lot of work given the difficult circumstances of COVID. Finding my place in college, having recently transitioned from a very underserved high school in New York City to a prestigious university like Penn, I knew that I was going to need a space like Quechua at Penn to really fuel my four years here.
We unfortunately received the news that our professor and program director, Americo Mendoza–Mori, was going to be transitioning to Harvard University. We knew that the space existed. We knew that the possibility was there. We just didn't know how to make it happen. I took it upon myself to bring this community back. It started with supporting the language courses and building connections with the Fulbright scholars who were coming to provide them. There was definitely a lack of space for Latino students who did identify with these Indigenous identities, so we created one where we can redefine what Latinidad means, where students can be themselves and have celebrations of Indigenous holidays. So we decided to establish a student board, and we relaunched our Andean representation program. We took in the Quechua at Penn board and integrated those two programs. It’s an all–women board; it’s great to see so many women in leadership positions, especially Indigenous women who, for the longest time, were not allowed to read, write, or even participate in anything. We were fully established as a board last semester, so that's when we began having more structure. We threw our third annual Carnaval this year and invited local Indigenous musicians from New York to play traditional Andean instruments. We had a lot of our traditional cuisines and provided a space for students to put on their cultural wear that they otherwise wouldn't have the opportunity to do. It's been a really rewarding experience fighting for communities that are already struggling to find visibility within the spaces that are quote, unquote designed for us.
What is your experience, being Indigenous at Penn?
There are only a handful of us on campus. We have to be very intentional and persistent with what it is that we want to do and the kind of representation that we want to bring to our community. A lot of the time it can get very isolating; we can provide programming, but we've also faced a lot of difficulties in finding a permanent program director and consistent staff or applying for funding. We get asked the question: “What value is this bringing to the University of Pennsylvania?” That can be difficult because what we deem to be valuable, important, or even just knowledgeable does not fall into the stereotypical kind of definition of what that would look like. It has been an experience of carrying myself with a lot of intention and a lot of pride. I've taken a lot of Latino studies and political science classes. Looking into the information that I'm being given, about my own communities, I think about what I can share back. At the forefront of a lot of my experience, it's been, how do I leave this for someone else? What more can I do for the people that look like me or those who share these experiences? Because we go through a lot. Indigenous women have the highest rates of sexual violence; those trends translate to Penn. While there are support systems like La Casa that may bring some kind of home or comfort to you, at the core, there's something more to what your identity is in that aspect. I’m fighting for that space and making sure that it can be sustainable.
How do you stay connected to your Quechua identity outside of Quechua at Penn?
I’m currently working with the Mayor's Office of Immigrant Affairs. I provide immigration–related rights clinics to community–based organizations throughout the city of New York. I'm actively working specifically with Indigenous communities to make sure that resources are made available to them. I was able to have the Mayor's Office create a manual for legal rights and different kinds of resources that you have in Quechua, which has been able to inform a lot of our communities, especially in the Queens area of New York City. I’ve been able to kind of redefine Indigeneity outside of South America, and what that looks like, especially for a lot of youth who have been displaced, or who are looking to revitalize either their language, traditions, or identities. You may not be in your Indigenous community, but you can take that with you, and you can do so proudly. There are people here who do so, who encourage you to do so.
Outside of that, I'm also really engaged with a lot of other networks of students and scholars who focus on Andean research and disciplines that not a lot of people have knowledge about. We get to work really closely together and have intergenerational dialogue.
The last way I remain connected with my Indigenous roots is definitely through storytelling. Whether it's at the university or any other space that I can, oral histories are a big part of who we are and how we live our lives. Being able to not only pass on the oral histories of our family members but also create our own, allows you to bring that visibility. That's how I stay connected through generations.
We're in a very precarious time for immigrants and it's always been precarious for Indigenous people. How do you cultivate joy and practice self–care amid this?
Right now, a lot of our community members are just scared. It’s been hard, especially when you are the first point of contact for a lot of communities who recently arrived. We're also dealing with the ever–changing political system. Honestly, it’s genuinely being in the community, whether that’s through music, food, or dances. In those experiences, we remember who we are and where we come from. The Indigenous experience has been filled with political challenges and legal restrictions. There are experiences we may not have faced directly, but our grandparents or parents did. Intergenerational conversations and experiences are the most beneficial in times like these where we don't know what will happen. A lot of the time, neither did our grandparents or our parents. We lean on one another to push ourselves up. Music especially really us to do that, whether through playing instruments or singing in your own language. I know a lot of people have been more hesitant to do that or even just speak it, because of what they might have to deal with after. In spaces where that's celebrated definitely, it lifts a bit of that burden. It reminds us that through more than 500 years of colonization, a lot of learning, and unlearning, we’ve conquered it all. There's so much to learn from the battles that our grandparents and our parents fought.
What does the future hold for you after you graduate?
I’m going to return to New York and continue working for the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs. My previous efforts really highlighted the importance of having not only someone there who cares but also someone who understands where you're coming from. That inspired me in wanting to pursue a legal education to become an immigration attorney. I lived too many years in the constant unknowing of what to do and how to work with these different legal systems, and feeling lost because of that Indigenous background. The linguistic inaccessibility that exists for a lot of our communities is something that I've seen my entire life. I've seen family members struggle at the border while getting detained because they can't communicate themselves properly, or they can't understand Spanish, because that's not what they speak. Had it not been for my role here at the Mayor's Office, they would have never had that kind of representation. It's really pushed me to want to pursue that for myself. At the end of the day, I really just want to support and create community. Connecting communities to information that is accessible to them is always something that I'm constantly advocating for. It's something that we should be more mindful of, in all the spaces.
Lightening Round:
Favorite traditional Kichwa food? Mapahuira con mote (sauce with traditional maize corn)
Go to space on campus? La Casa Latina
Favorite thing to do back in Ecuador? Herding my cows
Favorite Class at Penn? Locating the Andean Radical Tradition
Most random hobby? Dress To Impress with my little sister
There are two types of people at Penn ... Those who take language courses and those who test out of them.
And you are? I revitalize and reclaim Indigenous languages.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Do you know that one senior who brings a smile to everyone’s face or always has the craaaziest stories? It’s time to give them the recognition they deserve. Ego of the Week seeks to showcase seniors not for their grades or any other academic construct, but for who they are as a person and the joy they bring to the people around them! Nominate your favorite Penn seniors for Ego of the Week!
