I didn't decide to pursue higher education until November 2007 during my senior year of high school when I joined Veronica Labrador's Spanish 4 class. Ironically, I registered for the course because I needed filler for my schedule as a senior.
I was accepted into Ms. Labrador's alma mater - St. Bonaventure University, a private school approximately 80 miles from Buffalo - in March 2008. I gained admission into their exclusive Arthur O. Eve Higher Education Opportunity Program (HEOP) and was forced to leave my hometown the night I graduated to attend Bonaventure's mandatory HEOP five-week summer program.
I made great friends at St. Bonaventure and picked up some amazing learning habits I wouldn't have acquired otherwise. Thank you, Margaret Bryner and Veronica Williams, for taking that chance on me.
Unfortunately, St. Bonaventure's population, which was about the same size as my high school's, and the constant social microscope on people of color in the rural town of Olean, N.Y., put the brakes on my "good journey." By the time Spring Break came around, I was accepted at UB as a transfer student and had my sights set on starting over and enjoying my college career.
My hopes were quickly deflated, however, when I realized my credits from St. Bonaventure's Journalism and Mass Communication Department didn't directly transfer into the communication major at UB. My own ignorance led me to believe the two programs were similar, but it took me a year at UB to realize they weren't. I've since become an English major and wouldn't change that for the world.
On Monday, I came into the Student Union as I do every day, to work at The Spectrum and saw all the activities the UB Alumni Association had for the Class of 2012. All my classmates lined up, grinning from ear to ear without a care in the world, and put a knot in my stomach that only a talk with my mother could buffer.
Despite my mother's warm words, I can still see what my HEOP classmates and UB seniors are doing on Facebook or Twitter. I log on to these sites to see my old friends in their caps and gowns showing off their graduation rings and discussing their final events before commencement. I see them preparing for graduate school, internships, or their final move out of Buffalo and can't help but feel a step behind.
Luckily for my ego, a lot of students at UB find themselves in the same predicament. There are students who chose to take hiatus after high school. There are some in programs that require them to stay an undergrad for five or six years, and others who are nontraditional students who also don't get to graduate exactly four years after their high school commencement. But the feeling of not being as good as my classmates still plagues me from time to time.
Regardless, I'm proud of my classmates - even the ones I don't know. Attending college is a pipe dream where I come from, but my HEOP experience has taught me that finishing is the reward. Cynical thoughts about education aside, a degree brings you an opportunity; the rest is up to you.
Congratulations to the Class of 2012, not only at UB or St. Bonaventure, but everywhere my old classmates are. I'll see you guys on the other side.
Just give me another year.
Email: elva.aguilar@ubspectrum.com
