Thank You, Abuela by Victoria

Thank You, Abuela by Victoria - May 2019 Scholarship Essay

I am a third-generation immigrant within a family who yearns for improvement. My abuelo and abuela escaped the instability of Mexico—with its unethical government and normalized crime—and planted themselves in Pharr, Texas. My abuela insisted on giving birth to children on the “safer side of the border,” because she desperately wanted her children to enjoy the wonderful freedoms of the United States. And this is exactly what she did.

Throughout their childhood, abuela encouraged her children—my father, tia, and tios—to at least obtain high school educations. She and abuelo could not afford a college education, nevertheless for the six children they had. However, their children fought against these financial restraints. My father recalls his first years in college:

I paid for everything out of pocket. At one point, I was working three jobs. I remember at one time when money was tight, I was rear-ended while at a red light. This driver didn’t want to go through his insurance to pay me, so he wrote me a check to replace my bumper. But I cashed that check and took the money straight to Pan Am [now called the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley] to pay for another semester.

My father refused to undermine the privileges presented to him. In his early twenties, he enlisted into the Marine Corps and remained serving his country out of gratitude until he decided to attend the university. He refused to excuse himself from an education because of his parents’ financial “situation.” These efforts led my father to a career in high school education, which after 25 years as a math teacher, has provided me the opportunity to obtain my undergraduate degree. And his evident hunger for improvement is embedded into my character.

I, too, longed to fight against the financial restraints of my family. I want to make abuela’s decision worthwhile. So, I submerged myself into the world of politics while at the University of Texas at San Antonio. In May of 2018, I was one of three women from the entire body of students admitted by the UT Austin Center for Women’s & Gender Studies to partake in a nonpartisan program called New Leadership Texas. The program targeted women belonging to ethnic minority communities. The program stressed the underrepresentation of women in politics and provided resources for effective leadership, which I eventually shared with women in Phi Alpha Delta, a pre-law fraternity in which I served as a board member. I received recognition from Mayor Steve Adler and State Representative Donna Howard for addressing the underrepresentation of minority women in American politics through the program.

The New Leadership Texas program cultivated compassion within me for the underrepresented and impoverished Hispanics in San Antonio. Shortly after the program, I—along with several colleagues of City Council—began the blueprints for what we would later call the Back-to-School Backpack event. We sent letters, which I drafted, to local businesses for contributions. Contributions were abundant. The event, held in September 2018, provided over 2,500 elementary school students with backpacked stuffed with countless supplies. Although the event warmed the hearts of many students (and parents), I desired to do something greater for Hispanic women particularly.

The New Leadership Texas program moved me to establish opportunity in San Antonio. Thankfully, City Councilman Greg Brockhouse—who is currently my employer—was just as enthusiastic about the idea as I was. In October 2018, I held my first Forum and Focus Group: Gender Equity on Boards & Commissions. This forum was in partnership with both City Council and the City Clerk, who supplied women of various ethnic minority communities with applications for vacant board and commission positions. This forum was an effort to adjust inequitable gender composition. Months after, I hosted the second forum and I’m currently planning the third.

My heart was undoubtedly humbled by the women I befriended during these forums and their experiences of inequality in the workplace. Among my achievements while working with San Antonio City Council, these forums were by far the greatest. If I was awarded a $10,000 grant, I would expand these efforts to my hometown, Edinburg. I would regularly host forums for not only prospective applicants, but for Hispanic women currently holding prominent city jobs—for networking purposes. Tens of laptops would be set-up with applications readily available to those interested in applying immediately. I would walk alongside these women, step-by-step, throughout their application process. I am confident that these forums will plant a seed of confidence in the Hispanic women I grew up with.