Four people were inducted Thursday into the inaugural class of the Arkansas Latino Hall of Fame.

A dinner and induction ceremony was held at the Wyndham Riverfront in North Little Rock.

The representatives are:

Andre Guerrero has dedicated his career to advancing educational equity and supporting marginalized communities, according to the Hall of Fame. website. Beginning with his work with Mexican-American migrant children in the lower Rio Grande Valley, Guerrero designed curriculum for language minority students, served as a foundation officer, directed a graduate program in education at Antioch College, and served as Commissioner for Spanish Language Business for Ohio. He also served two terms as a VISTA volunteer in the 1960s. For the last 25 years of his career, Guerrero was the state director of Linguistic Minority Student Programs at the Arkansas Department of Education. He established an ESL Graduate Academy training course that equipped more than 2,200 Arkansas public school teachers with ESL endorsements from 2000 to 2014.

Roberto Martinez, a Sevier County resident, moved from Chicago in 1980. Inspired by Arkansas’ slogan at the time — “Land of Opportunity” — he settled between Horatio and De Queen, embracing a dramatic lifestyle change from city ​​to rural life. , according to the website. Martinez faced challenges, but his perseverance led to significant achievements in agriculture. In 1987, his family was honored as the Sevier County Farm Family of the Year, and later that year, they won the district title. Martinez’s success inspired many, and today Sevier County boasts the largest number of Latino farmers in Arkansas.

Fabricio Medina-Bolivar earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Cayetano Heredia in Peru, followed by a Ph.D. in plant physiology from Pennsylvania State University. He pursued postdoctoral research in molecular biology at Virginia Tech and then joined the faculty at Arkansas State University in 2005. He is currently Professor of Plant Metabolic Engineering in the Department of Biological Sciences as well as Director of both Environmental Sciences , as well as molecular sciences. graduate programs in biosciences and conducts cutting-edge research in his laboratory at the Arkansas Biosciences Institute. He is dedicated to promoting leadership and higher education within the Hispanic community and other underrepresented groups, according to the website.

When Lisette Yang arrived in Little Rock in 1997, the number of Latinos in the state was a fraction of what it is now. The Hispanic population in Arkansas grew from 19,876 in 1990 to 186,050 in 2010 to 256,847 in 2020, according to the Encyclopedia of Arkansas. In this state of flux, Yang worked to help Latinos assimilate and communicate. She began working with Spanish interpreters and translators in Arkansas to help interpret at various hospitals. For several years, she interpreted for district courts across the state. She has also organized classes on Latino culture throughout the state. In 2005, she became the first Latina victim advocate in Arkansas, assisting more than 2,500 victims. In 2012, she joined the Pulaski County Child Protection Center as their first bilingual child forensic interviewer and served as an advocate for some of their Spanish speaking clients. A few years later, she was promoted to Lead/Senior Forensic Interviewer, a role that allowed her to interview over 7,000 children/adolescents and mentor other less experienced forensic interviewers. Last year, she became the first bilingual administrator of the Crime Victims Reparations Board for the Arkansas Department of Public Safety.

The Arkansas Latino Hall of Fame, an initiative of the North Little Rock Chamber of Commerce, “stands as a testament to our commitment to cultural richness and community engagement,” according to the website.