Berkley Center

After college, I volunteered for a nonprofit dedicated to empowering inner city youth in San Francisco. I translated documents into Spanish, which teachers would utilize to educate Spanish-speaking parents about higher education opportunities awaiting their children after high school. The nature of the position struck a chord with me because my parents lacked the knowledge to provide me with college guidance. My translations were distributed district-wide, reaching a larger audience than I had envisioned. Through this experience, I understood the main barrier to educational opportunities for Latino students is a lack of awareness of such opportunities, combined with a lack of educational role models.

As someone whose parents did not attend university, I feel blessed with an opportunity to be attending one of the best-regarded international relations master’s degree programs in the United States. When I look around the halls of the campus buildings, there is only one other American Latino male. I attribute this to a dearth of knowledge about educational opportunities in Latino communities in the U.S. This gap is magnified by the lack of education role models present in our community, especially for students with immigrant parents. Very few such students receive adequate guidance and mentorship about attending colleges. I was the salutatorian out of my graduating class of 400 students, but since my parents never attended college, but no one in my vicinity pushed me to apply to school outside of my home state of Arizona. It was not until graduate school that I realized that many stellar Ivy League and non-Ivy League universities offer comprehensive aid packages for most, if not all, of their students. The opportunities are there, but many students from low-education family backgrounds simply do not realize they exist. I do not inherently believe that elite colleges are better, but I strongly believe that Latino students are underrepresented because we lack the social infrastructure to push us for these opportunities.

My vision for addressing this problem for the underserved Latino population would be to establish a network of mentors and teachers who actively encourage minority high school students to apply to the best universities possible and enlighten them about other related opportunities, such as the benefits of studying abroad. When I reflect on the opportunities provided to my blue-collar parents, I see clearly that the educational opportunities provided to me as an American citizen are what account for this difference.