Why I wrote this book

I first learned about this amazing story through an article in the “Teaching Tolerance” magazine. I was amazed by this Latinx couple’s courage and persistence, and perplexed that I’d never heard about it as part of my education, nor in my adult life. Nobody I knew was familiar with it, either, so I decided to do something about it. The first year, I taught it to my students with a translation I made of the article. Seeing their engagement inspired me to continue growing the unit on Mendez v Westminster throughout the last four years. Its last iteration was this novel’s manuscript, for which my students were beta readers. It was a great feeling to hear their applause when I brought the published copy to their next level classroom!