This article documents how the authors, two Chicana tenured professors from immigrant and working-class backgrounds, drew upon their graduate school experiences as resources for navigating the tenure track. They discuss lessons learned not in the official classroom but in other spaces inhabited by women of color. Such lessons included: networking with other women of color--both from universities and professional organizations, like the collective "Mujeres Activas en Cambio Social" (MALCS); the double standards placed on women of color scholars and their journeys toward becoming pathbreakers; and resisting academia's heavy-handed socialization to gatekeeping.