Fr. Joaquin Martinez, SJ grew up in Manila, Philippines where he attended Jesuit schools. He graduated from the University of the Philippines (BS in Biology, 1986) and was a Science teacher in both public and private schools in Los Angeles before entering the California Province of the Society of Jesus in 1991.
Fr. Martinez did his philosophy studies at Loyola University Chicago (MA, 1996). He taught Biology and Chemistry, and helped direct the Campus Ministry program at Loyola High School in Los Angeles from 1996 to 2000. Theology studies were done at the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley (MDiv, 2003). He was ordained a priest in Los Angeles in June of 2003.
Following ordination, Fr. Martinez did studies in Educational Administration at Harvard University (EdM, 2004). From 2004 to 2007, he was Asst. Principal for Campus Ministry at St. Ignatius College Prep in San Francisco and spent the following year in Tertianship in Boston and Amman, Jordan. He served as President of St. John’s Jesuit High School & Academy in Toledo, Ohio from 2008 to 2013 before working as a vocation promoter for the California Jesuits. Fr. Martinez joined the Jesuit Refugee Service as the International Education Coordinator in 2014. He started as Director of the Newman Center at UCSD in 2017.