latino role models
Rossana Rosado
Publisher and CEO -
El Diario La Prensa (New York)

Rossana Rosado has spent 14 of her twenty one years in the media at El Diario La Prensa. Since 1999, she has run the day to day operations of the oldest Spanish-language newspaper in the country. From 1995 to 1999, she was the Editor in Chief, responsible for the newsroom and all content.

During her media career, Ms. Rosado has been a reporter at El Diario-La Prensa where she covered the Bronx, City Hall, and wrote a daily column. In 1988, she joined WPIX, Inc. as a producer of Public Affairs programming. She became the sole producer of a daily public affairs program called “Best Talk in Town”. She was later promoted to Public Service director, responsible for the creation and placement of hundreds of Public Service Announcements on the air.

In 1992 she was appointed Vice President for Public Affairs at the Health & Hospitals Corporation for the City of New York. Her prior experience includes management positions at WPIX-TV, work at WCBS-AM and FM radio, and WNYC-TV 31. She graduated from Pace University, in White Plains, New York, where she received her B.A. in Journalism.

Her many awards include an Emmy, a STAR award from the NY Women’s Agenda, a Peabody Award for Journalism. She served on Mayor Bloomberg’s transition team and is a board member of several organizations including the United Way of NYC, and the National Puerto Rico Forum.

She is a Bronx born and raised Puerto Rican who is married, has two children-13 and 10 and lives in White Plains, NY.

LatinoGraduate.net: You grew up in the Bronx. How was that like?

Rossana: I had a wonderful childhood. I grew up in an extended family. My grandfather owned a warehouse and then moved up to two and practically all the men in the family worked there. My father and uncles, worked there so he bought these three family homes joined by a drive way and we lived in one of the apartments. The other family members lived upstairs and the uncles lived on the middle floor, the whole building was family. We had a great childhood. We were much protected and there were always cousins and aunts from Puerto Rico staying temporarily. We were raised bicultural and bilingual.

LatinoGraduate.net: Sounds like you had your own little county in the building.

Rossana: Yes, that was our world. We played in the driveway and it was exciting growing up in the Bronx.

LatinoGraduate.net: When did the idea of you going to college begin?

Rossana: Actually, I did not know that I was going to attend college. I am the first college graduate in my extended family. When I was in my second or third year of high school a really dear friend of mine went to college in Michigan. It was then that I fell in love with the whole idea of moving away to go to school. I presented the idea to my parents and they didn’t think that this would be appropriate for us. We went into this very blindly and now that I look back at the process to attend college, it is almost scary how much we did not know. In fact, I wound up going to Pace University in New York City, which is 30 minutes from the Bronx. I had also been accepted to Fordham University but at the time I had no idea that Fordham was a better school nor was anyone in my high school advising me that perhaps I should attend Fordham. My only criterion was that I wanted to leave home. Actually I wanted to attend Syracuse University, several of my friends were going there majoring in communications. My father was absolutely against the idea of me moving out because I was leaving home. The compromise was Pace since it was near by and I didn’t drive. I did nevertheless want to live in the dorm but again, someone should have told me that I should have picked Fordham! I have not done badly with my current education. I was in the honor program in high school and when my classmates and I got back our SAT scores we were getting like 1500 (on a scale where the maximum was 1600). I got a 1300 and I felt I had done poorly on it. When I shared my score with my high school counselor and told him I had done poorly on it he said, “Are you crazy. It is a wonderful score and you will most likely get a scholarship.” Now I know it was a good score but since I was in a class with others that got 1400 I thought I was doing poorly. It’s amazing how many misconceptions one can have when one just does not know the facts. It was amazing how much I did not know and that is why helping students is so close to my heart. I want to help more people manage the process.

LatinoGraduate.net: It sounds like you could have been easily discouraged to attend college even though you were doing very well.

Rossana: Oh yes, exactly. I could have been discouraged because I was in a class of 400 kids and when they do the ranking I was ranked at 39 in my class. But this ranking was, for me, devastating and I did not realize I was in class with the top 10 students and so I was embarrassed. In the college application process it was interesting because up until my parents drove me to the campus they had not seriously thought this was really happening. They didn’t really think that they had a kid that could go to college. Now looking back, the financial aid process was so intimidating and because my parents owned a house and had four children plus they were working very hard since my father was a truck driver and my mom worked in a hospital so they were perceived us middle class. My parents had no college fund so it was a kind of tough situation and I think I just forced them down this path of making this happen and we did.

LatinoGraduate.net: How did you enter this exciting media world?

Rossana: This was somewhat another “accident” in the sense that even before I wanted to go to college I wanted to write. I was and still am an avid reader. Even now I don’t own a television set for me. My kids do have one. I really like to read and when I was ten years old I use to write books during the summer. I would color pictures and include them. I wanted to be a writer up to the day I arrived to Pace University. During my first semester I was going to be an English major so that I could write and maybe teach. During my first semester the head of the English department who happened to be a nun called me in and asked me what I was planning to do with an English degree. I responded that I was thinking of teaching and I mentioned that I was a freshman and working in the writing center tutoring kids that were older than me. So clearly my strength was in English and Literature. She said to me,” I don’t think you can teach English because you have an accent.” I responded,” what accent? I am from the Bronx!” She just came at me with all these biases and I didn’t know how to deal with it because at that time I was around 19 years old. I told her that I wanted to write so she recommended journalism and my response was, “okay.” So there I am. I switched over. I remember going to my first journalism class and these white kids had reporter pads and they were in this mode and I am wondering, “what the hell...” I had no clue what was going on. Yet after taking my first two journalism classes I fell in love with the idea that I can write and make money! I fell in love with the whole idea of going out and researching. It is actually such a simple job. You go out, talk to people, do your interview and write it down. When I started you did actually write it down on paper. Now you have all these super duper recording devices and you listen and record and then you write a story based on your own impressions. I loved it.

LatinoGraduate.net: Clearly you are not an introvert.

Rossana: No, not at all. I am curious by nature and I like to go after the story that other people just didn’t think were stories.

LatinoGraduate.net: What does it take to be a successful reporter?

Rossana: I think what it takes is a sincere desire to know what people think. One must have a sincere curiosity to know how things work and learn why they happen. You cannot be an objective observer and be a journalist. You have to be passionate and curious. You have to be able to ask questions and to be sincerely interested. What I love, but can also be frustrating about journalism is that you are never an expert in anything. You are an expert on the last story you did. In the big papers you can spend three, four months or up to a year on one story, one series or one investigation and at the end of that you are the expert on something like Medicare. But the truth is that you are not really an expert and the next day you could be doing a story on the circus. You wind up being a person who knows a little bit about a lot of things as oppose to knowing a lot of things about any one thing.

LatinoGraduate.net: Sound like journalist have to be very flexible about what they will work on next and that they have to be willing to constantly learn something new.

Rossana: People in other professions find it very difficult to be in a profession where you don’t know what you will be working on today or you don’t have time to become an expert on one thing. Again, in the big papers you can be the expert on educational or cultural issues but this is more of a luxury. In the small papers you could be covering war today and elephants tomorrow and that is just the way it is.

LatinoGraduate.net: You made the switch from electronic to print media. You started in journalism then went to work for television and radio and you returned to the print industry. Did you start in the print industry?

Rossana: Actually my first job out of college was at CBS radio and then after I went over to El Diario newspaper. Then I left the newspaper and went into television. I spent 5 years there and I won an Emmy and then went three years to work in the government sector. What happened was that there was a very interesting historical event in New York. Manuel, who had been my mentor and editor-in-chief at El Diario, had been out of the paper for four years. I had just given birth to my son and Manuel was killed in a bar in Queens and he was basically a hit ordered by the drug cartel from Colombia. He had been writing about the drug trafficking. He was a journalist and did nothing else for a living. That was very scary for me. My son was just four months old and I had to ask myself if I was willing to do this at the risk of losing my life. I was not sure I had that kind of commitment so I left the media altogether and went to work in city government. I went to work as the head of public affairs for the New York hospitals. This was a high-level post serving as VP but I said, “Maybe I’ll try health care.” This happened around the time when former President Bill Clinton and his wife were trying to promote health reform and it really did not happen the way they had planned it but in fact the industry did reform itself. So I was in health care when it was really a shifting paradigm in this area. I found it fascinating and I thought to getting into the marketing side of health care. This meant I would get the messages about preventive care over to our community. At that time the owners of El Diario asked me to return over a period of six months and my response was, “Been there, done that.” Yet they were persistent and told me that they had the right job for me. They offered me the position to be the editor-and chief. I thought, “God, I would have done that for free.” I took job and a significant pay cut but it was one of those opportunities that came along.

One issue that was previously asked is how one becomes successful in career and life. The response is that you have a general plan for the future but you also have to stay open to the possibilities to opportunities that present themselves. Sometimes they take you in a whole different path but you have to be able to roll with the punches. I observed that I could take this new path and I kept in mind that I could always return to the old one. I had my plan but I was not steadfast to it. I do admire people that have a plan and stick to it no matter what. One of the complaints about my own life is that, “I never followed a plan!”

LatinoGraduate.net: Sounds like you follow a plan like a reporter. You run off to whatever the next story is developing.

Rossana: I talk with people that say, “I have a five year plan.” I think it’s so cool! I would like to do that but life has been a series of experiences where I jump in because of curiosity and I end up on new paths.

LatinoGraduate.net: That is what you get for going into a candy store where there is so much to choose from and practically all of it within reach.

Rossana: Yes, something like that.

LatinoGraduate.net: You sound very happy with what you are doing.

Rossana: Oh I love it! There are so many days when I say, “It’s time for me to move on since I have been here for ten years”. I did four years as editor and I have been a publisher for six years. It is quite a transiting moving from the new room over to the business management side. I love it. I do.

LatinoGraduate.net: Sounds like your curiosity will take you to new heights. Who did you meet while you were a reporter for both the electronic and print areas?

Rossana: I have had such an exciting time. I have met presidents of Latin America, Nelson Mandela, and the Pope. I was just sharing with someone the other day how being the publisher allows me to enter so many different rooms. His response was that it sounded like I was Forrest Gump. It’s true. I met Nobel Lauderate Rigoberta Manchu, Cesar Chavez when he came to New York. I feel like I have been in very historical places and moments. My position as reporter, editor and publisher has allowed me to watch history. I have also experienced being part of the Hispanic media at a time of incredible growth and historic moments. Look at what happened. One day we were invisible and then all of the sudden we have arrived. It has been very rewarding to be in a room with other New Yorkers who are much wealthier and more powerful and yet they are all really interested in my people and my community. They want to know how to get to them and perhaps sell them soap. They are also very helpful. I can think of many times when I have made contact with someone in the corporate world on behalf of any student or reader and gotten a “no" response. I don't think that would ever happen.

Rossana: I think that this field has not been an attractive choice for students because we do not have high enrollment in journalism schools and people would rather be on television and radio, which is okay. I think we are losing the art of writing although I do have to say that part of the advent of the internet world had taken us to focus more on our writing skills. Some people who are on the internet can’t spell and that worries me. I think this is a great profession. It is the only way to affect the way that Latinos are represented in media is to have Latinos in media. That is a huge goal and even today in New York city where we just had a luncheon where we honored men in media, we honor women in another month, and I realized that twenty years ago when I was just out of school I had no role models. They were very far and in between and now I know people who are young Latinos and mature ones as well at the New York Times, NBC News, and other large media organizations. It is one of the thrills of my life to be able to pick up the phone and say to a producer of 20/20 show can you help me get a hold of someone who needs an intern and get them started. I think it is a great career but it is not an easy career because it is like a “cop on a beat”. It is going out and pounding the pavement to get stories and leads. It is only fun if it is your passion and if it is not then it is like anything in life where if it is not your passion then it will only be work and this work is just to hard to do for only work sake. There are easier ways to make a living. So you really need to do this if you have a passion.

LatinoGraduate.net: I can imagine that you are incredibly busy in your profession and working in New York City. Why and how do you find the time to also be a volunteer and be involved in so many community organizations?

Rossana: I do it because I think as a Latina I feel guilty for my success. I believe, and I have had these conversations with my colleagues of other cultures and I say it is a Latino thing but I think Jewish people feel the same and same holds true for Italians, Blacks and others. When you reach a certain level of success you really can’t enjoy it if you shut your eyes to the need in your own community or in the larger community wherever you happen to be living. I guess some people do but I can’t live in a way that says I have arrived and forget about everyone else. The biggest pleasure for me at the end of day is when I put the paper out and I met my goals and paid my kids tuition and all that is can I help someone get a better job or can I help someone get an internship. I ask myself if I can help someone complete a college application or to pick the right high school. Think that is just an obligation that I can do through the community organizations like United Way or through my involvement with the New York public schools. I can’t enjoy my success unless I am helping those that helped me arrive here. We must reach back and help those in need. This is the way we were raised. You can’t just be successful and look down on others. I do have times when I wish I could just shut all that out and just enjoy my life differently but I can’t.

LatinoGraduate.net: Advice in closing?

Rossana: My advice to students is not to think that they will just finish their education and that they will get the job they want. It just does not happen that way. It rarely happens that way. Perhaps it happens in the movies but not in real life. You have to make your opportunities and you have to ignore the naysayers even when they are within your own family. You have to ignore the pressures that want to put you in a box and just go for it! You have to do that when you are young because you have a lot of time. Sometimes when we are young we don’t see that. When I was in college I was in a rush to get out of college because I wanted to start paying back my student loans but little did I know that it would take me fifteen years. My advice is that you start out with a plan but you remain flexible plus shut out all the negative interventions. Some of it comes from people that love you a lot and it is a hard thing to do. This is especially true for Latinas because as soon as you graduate perhaps around 21 years of age and people start asking, “Well, do you have a boyfriend and are you going to get married?” One gets many conflicting messages and you have to be able to withstand that and make your own way. One of the great challenges for Latino males and women in this country today, and this even if they have parents of a second or third generation living here, is how to maintain the utmost respect, regard and reverence for my parents and yet tell them to, “Stay out of my life!” You see it in other cultures when people tell their children, “Okay, it is time for you to move on.” or “It’s time for you to move out of the house” and then the parents are helping you pick an apartment. But our parents are suffering and crying and that is really tough on the kids but it has to be done. We have to find our own way.

Copyright © 2005 Armando F. Sanchez

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