I'm a published poet, bilingual STEM educator [SP/EN], and learning experience designer. For close to 20 years, I've been searching for ways to make science education feel less like translation and more like recognition, especially for students navigating multiple languages, cultures, and educational systems.

My teaching career began in Puerto Rico and continued in New York and North Carolina, where I've spent six years designing biology curriculum for multilingual learners, recent arrivals, and refugee populations, and Advanced Placement Learners (AP Bio). I didn't just teach Bio—I wrote poems about mitochondria and proteins, then used those poems as teaching texts. My students annotated Elogio a la mitochondria to identify cellular processes, traced their ancestry through maternal DNA inheritance, and connected jaguar conservation to their own stories of migration and survival. 

But somewhere along the way, I realized that the systems designed to support learning often exclude the very students who need them most. I watched brilliant minds labeled "behind" simply because they were assessed in their second language, third country, fourth school. The traditional classroom structure—with its rigid schedules and single-format assessments—no longer fit the work I needed to do. So I made a deliberate shift: from teaching biology to designing learning experiences that center accessibility, cultural responsiveness, and equity from the start.

I recently completed the University of Michigan's + Coursera Learning Experience Design specialization, where I formalized two decades of intuitive practice into systematic frameworks. My design philosophy is grounded in Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and DEIJ principles—not as add-ons, but as foundational architecture. I create bilingual learning experiences, integrate AI tools as accessibility partners for multilingual learners, and design assessments that measure thinking rather than format compliance. A preview of a project in development, From the Mitochondria to the Jaguar, demonstrates how poetry, genetics education, and conservation ethics can converge in a single learning experience that honors Puerto Rican identity and scientific rigor.

I'm currently seeking remote, flexible learning experience design opportunities where I can bring my combination of published creative work, classroom expertise, and formal instructional design training. If you're looking for someone who understands how to design learning that's rigorous and culturally responsive, scientifically accurate and emotionally resonant, I'd welcome the conversation.