Elizabeth Velazquez

Elizabeth Velasquez was born in Sullivan County, New York. Her father is Puerto Rican and her mother is Peruvian. She moved to Queens in 2005, and worked as an artist and art teacher at PS 89 in Cypress Hills, Brooklyn.

"I think that it’s important to see role models in different positions because when we’re young, we kind of follow habits, and if kids see, again and again, that people that look like them are only working at the deli, or working in cleaning, and not to say that they won't do other things, because it has been done, but I think that for them to stop feeling that feeling that they're less than, that I think it creates. I think it’s important for them to see people that are like them, that look like them, or are from the same backgrounds in different positions."