[4] She later attended Cal State Los Angeles for her bachelor's in Rehabilitation Counseling and received a master's degree from Pacific Oaks College in Human Development.
[5] When Darder was three, her mother brought her to the mainland during the Operation Bootstrap post-war migration when more than 500,000 Puerto Ricans emigrated[6] to the United States between 1949 and 1959.
[7] Raised in poverty in East Los Angeles, Darder was a young mother with three children when she began her studies at Pasadena City College in 1972.
She attended California State University Los Angeles and then Pacific Oaks College, where she earned a master's degree in Human Development with a specialization in Marriage, Family and Child Counseling.
[19] In addition to her recognition as a distinguished professor and endowed chair of ethics and moral leadership at Loyola Marymount, Darder has received numerous awards and honors for both her scholarly and community contributions.
Along with a national Kellogg Foundation Fellowship, she has also received the Social Justice in Education Award from the University of New Mexico, an Outstanding Book of the Year honor from the American Educational Research Association for her book Reinventing Paulo Freire: A Pedagogy of Love, and recognition for her Outstanding Service to the Latino Community from El Centro de Acción Social.
[27] In 1984, Darder traveled to visit a friend in the Coyoacán neighborhood of Mexico City and there discovered the museum La Casa Azul (the Blue House) which was the residence of renowned painters Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.
Darder experienced such inspiration from her daily afternoon sojourns to the Blue House that she began painting immediately after returning home from Mexico City.
[40] Darder co-authored with Rodolfo Torres[41] the book After Race: Racism After Multiculturalism, and was editor of Culture and Difference (Bergin & Garvey, 1995).
[44] Continuing to provide ongoing perspective in the field, Darder served as an Associate Editor and Advisory Board Member for the journal Latino Studies.
[45] In 2009, Darder's documentary, Breaking Silence: The Pervasiveness of Oppression, was awarded the second place prize at the Central Illinois Women's Film Festival.