Maria Estrada González

A Peruvian educator who pioneered rural schooling and women’s literacy programs in the Andes Mountains.

Maria Estrada González (1905–1975) revolutionized education in Peru’s remote Andean regions through her grassroots initiatives. Born into a Quechua-speaking family, she became the first woman from her community to earn a teaching degree in 1930. Defying cultural taboos, she established the Escuela de los Andes in 1942, a mobile school system that traveled by mule to teach literacy and agricultural techniques to indigenous communities. Her “Andes Literacy Project” trained over 200 female educators, empowering them to run schools in their villages.

González’s work was groundbreaking in its focus on preserving indigenous languages while promoting Spanish literacy. Her 1958 book Voices from the Peaks documented oral histories of Andean women, preserving cultural heritage. She also lobbied successfully for Peru’s 1960 Education Reform Act, which mandated bilingual education in rural areas. Despite her impact, her contributions were marginalized during the military regimes of the 1960s. Modern scholars now recognize her as a precursor to modern community-based education models.