Ana Beatriz Cholo

Ana Beatriz Cholo

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Ana Beatriz Cholo is a former news reporter who has worked for the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Associated Press and Press-Telegram in Long Beach.

Ms. Cholo spent much of her career covering human interest and education stories, most notably those coming out of Chicago public schools, the third largest school district in the country. She was part of the education team at the Chicago Tribune, which was awarded the Edward Scott Beck Award for national reporting.

Shortly after graduating from high school, Ms. Cholo served four years in the U.S. Navy (pre-DADT). She spent two years (1988 to 1990) stationed on the USS Simon Lake in Holy Loch, Scotland, where her primary duty was overseeing storerooms and carrying heavy crates up and down steep ladders whilst wearing not-so-sexy dungarees. Her last two years in the military (1990 to 1992) were spent driving a forklift and working with a Seabees construction unit at Roosevelt Roads Naval Air Station in Puerto Rico.

She is a graduate of the University of Southern California and holds a dual degree in History and Print Journalism from the Annenberg School of Journalism & Communication.

Ms. Cholo is a first-generation immigrant and speaks Spanish and Portuguese. She has also worked as a social activist, photographer and country music disc jockey. She lives in Seal Beach, Calif. with her teenage son Richard, her partner and their 4-year-old autistic son Jude. She is working on her first book, a memoir called "Sailor Girl."

Blog Entries by Ana Beatriz Cholo

How I Began to Grow a Social Justice and Racial Consciousness, Circa April 29, 1992

Comments | Posted May 1, 2012 | 1:26 PM

From an apartment in Biloxi, Miss., I watched on TV as Los Angeles burned, rioted and turned itself inside out on April 29, 1992.

Days before, I had stepped off a plane from Naval Station Roosevelt Roads in Puerto Rico where I had been stationed.

I was in...

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Growing Up a Real Cholo

(4) Comments | Posted March 20, 2012 | 7:35 AM

Cholo? Your last name is Cholo?

Even in Disneyland's Critter Country, I can't escape from my name. The lady at the Hungry Bear restaurant was holding my credit card in her hand and looking at me quizzically. She admitted she had never come across a real Cholo in all...

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Grieving For Two Little Boys I Never Knew

(5) Comments | Posted February 9, 2012 | 10:06 AM

I follow the news constantly so when I heard about a missing person's case involving a woman in Utah just over two years ago, it caught my attention. Her husband claimed he had taken their two very young sons for a midnight camping trip. In a blizzard. To the middle...

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Letting Go: A Love Letter to My Daughter

(2) Comments | Posted January 12, 2012 | 1:24 PM

My 19-year-old daughter stepped onto an plane today and left the California sunshine for a rural town in Tennessee to live with her father's family.

About three years ago, after 16 years of me raising her and against my will, she moved in with her father who lives about...

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Gearing Up for Another Fight: Keeping LGBT History in Public Schools

(56) Comments | Posted November 21, 2011 | 9:53 AM

The anti-equality folks behind the Stop SB 48 campaign suffered a recent disappointment a few weeks ago. Their ballot referendum to repeal SB 48 -- the FAIR (Fair, Accurate, Inclusive, and Respectful) Education Law -- failed to qualify because they did not gather enough signatures.

But on Thursday, Nov....

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Extreme Makeover After a Tragedy: Salon Meritage in Seal Beach Episode?

(4) Comments | Posted October 31, 2011 | 6:37 PM

I'm writing this post on a Saturday afternoon as I sit under a dryer in a hair salon.

If you've spent as much time as I have in a salon, you know it can be a comforting and validating place. You walk in looking like a hausfrau, you emerge...

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Anatomy of a Flash Mob (And How You Can't Pray the Gay Away)

(5) Comments | Posted October 5, 2011 | 10:45 AM

A few weeks ago, I organized a flash mob to Madonna's "Like a Prayer" to tell Michele Bachmann and hubby Marcus that you actually can't "pray the gay away." The YouTube video is now up to over 91,000 views, and it's technically gone viral, at least...

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