Most of my life has been unplanned.
It’s not that I didn’t try to plan—it’s just that whatever I pictured always turned out to be so much bigger, richer, and more meaningful than I could have imagined. My time at the Language and Culture Center at the University of Houston is a perfect example.
Back in the fall of 1973, I needed just three more hours to finish my Master’s in Comparative Education with Latin America. Scanning the course listings, I spotted a class called Teaching English as a Second Language. I thought, Fine. That’ll do.
Little did I know that walking into that classroom would change the direction of my life. The class was taught by Professor Joyce Merrell Valdes—who would later found the Language and Culture Center. At the time, teaching international students wasn’t considered as “cool” as teaching literature, but Joyce didn’t care. She dove into the field, joined professional organizations, and became one of the early leaders in this new area of education.
Joyce was also trying to convince the university to start an Intensive English Language Program. They weren’t interested. So, she did something bold—she made a deal with IIE and brought 24 Venezuelan students to Houston to study English, without official permission. And just like that, in June of 1975, the Language and Culture Center was born.
I was her first hire.
Honestly, I had no idea what I was doing. I helped students find apartments, took them grocery shopping, and tried to remember everything I’d just learned in Joyce’s class. By that fall, our student population had tripled, and we brought on three more teachers.
We were inventing things as we went. There were almost no textbooks or materials, so we made our own audio tapes and came up with creative ways to register students from around the world.
By the time I retired in 2005, the Language and Culture Center had become one of the top intensive English programs in the country. Thousands of students had walked through the doors of the Roy Cullen Building. We’d hosted hundreds of cultural fairs, and I’d had the joy of creating and teaching a Cross-Cultural Communication course for 17 years. I had taught for a year at the l’Institut National d’ ELECtronique in Algeria, trained at Stanford University’s Intercultural Communication Institute, began developing the Culture Bump approach to connection beyond differences, completed my doctorate and forged lifelong friendships. Later, I worked with global corporations, helping Americans prepare for assignments abroad—and welcoming people from around the world to work in the U.S.
But more than any of that, I had the gift of sitting—day after day, year after year—with men and women from every corner of the globe. Through their stories, their laughter, and their courage, I came to know the world in a way no book could ever teach.
I learned, beyond theory or philosophy, that we are truly brothers and sisters—bound not by culture or language, but by our shared humanity.
For that, I will always be grateful.
Amazing grace.
Thank you…amazing grace
