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I was first introduced to MiraCosta because; my mom was going to the Community Learning
Center to learn English. And she let me know, she informed me that there was uh, Adult High
School program. And so, she threw a lifeline out to me and I took it. I was just interested
in getting the G.E.D. and getting out as soon as possible but I met a counselor there by
the name of Freddy Ramirez. And Freddy kind of expressed to me uh, the benefits of the
Adult High School diploma but, then he also started expressing to me the benefits of going
to an Associates degree at the main campus.
At first, it was a little intimidating to step into a college classroom um, because
I never thought I was going to get a high school diploma let alone, being enrolled in
college. My first year and a half I took remedial classes. So, I learned how to write sentences
at MiraCosta, I found out what a fragment sentence is, I learned how to do Algebra here.
Um, I was a high school dropout.
(Announcer: Jamie Figueroa)
After I graduated from MiraCosta, I was accepted to UC Berkley, and I went to UC Berkley for
two and half years, and I received my B.A. in Political Science from the University of
California Berkley.
Now, I am back in the community here in Oceanside my hometown. And I am serving inner city community,
I working with at risk youth, middle school to high school students in a prevention program
helping them, hopefully to come to MiraCosta and go on to a university.
I was the first male in my family to graduate from college. Me and my sister were the first
um, first people in our family to go to college. But now, there is, we have, the number of
cousins that we have in college is bigger then it have been before. And we have a lot
of them here at MiraCosta so; I think it done wonders for my family.
My wife, um she just graduated from MiraCosta College and she's at San Diego State, studying
Social Work. And she's an employee here so we bleed MiraCosta.
I always tell me, I did graduate from Berkley but, you know when, whenever I get that luxury
car I'm a have the MiraCosta Alumni license plate on there, not probably not the Berkley
one.