[music playing]

Gloria Martinez: My name is Gloria Martinez. I am a former ESL student. I took classes here. And today I have been invited here to share with you my story on what I have gone through in my desire to pursue a higher education. I didn't have the support of my parents. So I lacked their support. I got pregnant at a very young age, which was 14, had my daughter when I was 15. I was very young and my husband was a little bit older, but still we weren't mature, and we didn't have anything to offer to our daughter.

So that's why we decided to come to this country because we didn't have anything to offer to her, anything but love. And we say that we didn't want to have her to lead the same life that we were living. Someone told me about the adult school and I said, OK, I want to learn English, so I can finally get a job.

Lawrence Wadahara: You have to know Gloria from the beginning. I mean, she came back and she told me, Oh, I'm going to graduate Mt. SAC. And I said, good. Then she started telling me all the accomplishments, I go, wow, you've done really good. You know, I'm going to nominate you for this, and we'll see what happens.

She's very good at putting words together. And I think I've seen that by being there helping her with the resume and all that. She's always kept in touch with me through the email and calling me up and telling me, hey, can I get your assistance with this or that?

Jennifer Martin: She inspires everybody around here. She is highly motivated. She's very industrious. She's worked for many, many years. She goes to school, works, takes care of her child, and still finds time to inspire other people.

Debra Jensen: Gloria was wonderful to have in class because she was part of a group, and she was not the center, as in the most verbal and vocal and leading everyone. But she was the pillar that kept them all focused. This is my goal, I'm moving ahead, come on, come with me.

Gloria Martinez: I'll be transferring to Cal Poly Pomona this coming fall to get my bachelor's degree in business administration with an emphasis in accounting. Now my main goal is to become a certified public accountant.

Irma Sanders: Coming from a background where women, females were not encouraged to pursue an education or not go beyond the boundaries of what was in her culture assigned to her, she had that determination and she had that curiosity to go outside those boundaries.

Gloria Martinez: Just think how I was going to tell my husband that I was going to continue with my education, that was going to be something really big for us, because in my culture, we were taught that education could not be possible for women.

Debra Jensen: There's obstacles of money. There's obstacles of time. There's obstacles of, OK, I've got to be a mother. I've got to be a wife. I've got to have a job, and now I've got school and we have no money for school, because the money from the job goes to the family. That's pretty heavy.

Irma Sanders: She really has tried to encourage her classmates, especially the females, to continue to with their education, continue to study.

Gloria Martinez: Many students come to this school just hoping to learn English. But for any reason, then they stop coming to school, and sometimes they never come. They thought that this is very difficult. And I want to let them know that when everything it's possible, IT'S just the matter of being a committed and constant in their education.

Karen Bahena: I'm really proud of her because she's finished her education. And just because she had us, it doesn't mean that she could stop. When I grow up, I want to learn the criminal justice. And my goal is to go to Harvard. But if I can't, I want to go to Cal Poly Pomona.

Gloria Martinez: If it wouldn't be for this education, I wouldn't make it through college, not even to university. But thanks to the- again, thanks to all the support I received from teachers, the staff from here, is that I became motivated to set goals and tried to achieve them, how to pursue them, and that's how I ended up getting a college degree and now transferring to university.

[music playing]