Family Dream Carries Immigrant Through Hardship To UC Santa Cruz Diploma

(KPIX 5) -- "It felt like a dream and it still feels like a dream." That's the way Ana Avalos describes graduating from University of California, Santa Cruz this year with a 3.4 grade point average.

It's an impressive GPA for someone who didn't speak any English when she arrived in the Bay Area at the age of 14.

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Ana came specifically to get an education, and she wanted that badly enough to live in the U.S. without her parents. She is the first in her family to graduate from college; an accomplishment so significant that relatives saved enough money to bring her mother and brother from Guatemala to watch her cross the stage.

At the Latino graduation ceremonies, she spoke from the podium with tears in her eyes, thanking her parents for believing in her. Her father had passed away, but he was very much with her in spirit. In Spanish, Ana said, "Mami, Papi, this is for you and because of you."

Other relatives who live in the U.S. were also there - and then there were the ones only Ana could see. "I wanted to tell the audience, you don't see them, but there are a bunch of people standing here next to me, my grandparents, my grandmothers especially," she said. "It felt like I had all my ancestors next to me, telling me, 'We did it.'"

A Students Rising Above participant, Ana was already in college when we first met her in 2014. She was back in the Bay Area for Christmas break, and visiting Mission High School where she graduated with honors.

We followed her through the long hallways where the staff was still working although the school was on holiday break. Teachers and others hugged her and greeted her affectionately. Ana always visited Mission High on college breaks. "I love coming back. This is my home," she explained. "It was all the teachers who made me feel like home."

That is an understatement when it comes to one teacher in particular - Derrlyn Tom - but we'll get to that in a minute.

First, we go back to when Ana first arrived in the United States. She and another sister moved in with an older sister who supported them by cleaning houses - no welfare or government assistance. Ana remembered what her older sister told her: "I see how much you love school … I love it too but there's this need … we have to sustain ourselves and I can work. You go to school. Don't give up."

Her older sister's sacrifice illustrates what family means to Ana. "My family is my biggest reason why I'm doing what I'm doing and why I'm going to school because I want to go back and help my mom. I'm going to go back and help my niece and nephew."

There was the heartache of missing home and family, and life was difficult financially, too. "We needed help and we had to work," she explained. They struggled for the basics, "food, transportation, a roof- where to stay." Ana would often clean houses sometimes with one sister, sometimes with the other.

Simultaneously, she was trying to learn English and go to school, carrying a dictionary with her everywhere.

Back to Mission High and teacher, Derrlyn Tom. Although Ms. Tom taught Chemistry, she would also talk about the day's events with a focus on social justice. It resonated with Ana, and they grew closer as Ana joined her teacher, advocating for immigrant rights. "She found out about my story," explained Ana, "and she's so welcoming".

Eventually Tom made a promise that would change both their lives. Ana remembered it like this: "I'll make you a promise that I will always help you with whatever you need, and she still remembers that promise." Eventually, Ana moved in with her teacher. "The more time we spent together, the more I would see her taking care of me as a mom," said Ana. "Things that no one would do except a mom."

So Ana began to call her that. "Mom."

Tom had no other children. "To really feel this strongly about having Ana call me mom, as she did, it's just hard to hard to describe…" she said. "It just gives me a different kind of purpose … what I share with someone as special as she is, and she is special to me."

Special indeed! Somehow, she had the imagination and the foresight to see the possibilities from that farm in Guatemala, where her parents labored as farmers but could not make enough money to pay for school.

As an indigenous woman, Ana said all she could do would be to become someone's maid. "Most of the women in Guatemala quit after 6th grade. That's it," she said. "I need to go to school. I wanted to go to school. I want to be someone one day. I want to be someone someday."

"Ana has something. There is something about her that she's so determined," said Tom. "The level of difficulty was insurmountable but if anyone was able to overcome it, it was her."

Ana graduated with a 3.8 GPA from Mission High School.

She graduated from UC Santa Cruz with degrees in Feminist Studies and Spanish Literature.

Tom was there with Ana's biological family at her graduation from college.

Ana carries the hope of her whole family, as she considers going on to grad school. "It's just about dreaming, pushing, persevering," she said.

She wants to do just that in her own community, helping other people like herself.