By Roy Mabasa

A newly-built elementary school in the City of Stockton, California will be named after the first Filipino-American to teach in the state of California.

This was announced after the Stockton Unified School District (SUSD) “overwhelmingly” voted to name a new K-8 school after Flora Arca Mata, considered by many as a pioneer after teaching in the Stockton unified school for 32 years until her retirement in 1980. She was also the first person of color to teach under the District’s jurisdiction.

The choice for Mata started when the Little Manila Rising, a Stockton-based organization composed of Filipino-Americans, successfully launched a campaign to put her on the list of the SUSD’s survey to give the new elementary school a name.

In a Facebook post on December 18, 2019, Little Manila Rising thanked the Filipino-American community in Stockton for “standing up for one of our own” after Flora garnered the most votes in SUSD’s selection process.

“Your voices matter,” the Filipino-American organization said.

It was reported that the new elementary school is currently under construction and is expected for completion in June 2020 and ready for occupancy by August 2020.

Born to Jose “Pepe” Arca and Victoria Salcedo in Honolulu, Hawaii, Flora was the second youngest of a family of six with three sisters and two brothers.

At the age of two, Flora and her family moved to Stockton where she attended the local schools.

With the help of her sister who worked on a farm to pay for her tuition in college, Flora graduated and received her teaching degree from the prestigious University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and earned the distinction as the first Filipino-American to graduate from the UCLA.

After college, Flora married fellow Filipino-American Vidal Mata and began working as a tutor and maid for the family which owned Campbell Soup, while her husband worked for English actor Boris Karloff.

In 1940, the couple decided to move to the Philippines to teach until the duration of World War II.

With the help of Karloff, the couple was able to return to Stockton where Flora started her teaching career in California under the SUSD’s jurisdiction for more than three decades. Flora continued to work as a substitute until she was 80 years old.

She died at the age of 95 in December 2013 and is survived by her son, Eddie Mata and daughter Vida Mata-Longley.