Personal Narrative: My High School Experience

Service is what I love to do. Throughout my high school experience, I have had the opportunity to work in my community which has lead to many rewarding experiences. I have been an active member and Vice President of Latinos in Action (LIA). In LIA, I have had the extraordinary chance to work not only with Hispanic students, but our larger community. We worked with Westvale, West Jordan, and Riverside elementary schools; tutoring students with their assignments and homework. In my sophomore and junior year, LIA and I picked a date around the end of the school year and had a bus drop us off at the canal, we walked back to school while picking up tons of trash in our neighborhood. In addition, in December, we created a project called “Hats for

Although, sometimes my uncle gives me the opportunity to earn a few bucks. He owns an upholstery shop called Rico’s Custom Upholstery. I has offered me work ever since I was in middle school, around 8th grade. I have done many things for him, from cleaning to cutting, sewing to paperwork, and as well as receiving customers and helping them on anything that they need. I usually go to work whenever he needs me, but lately, I have been going about two times a week for five hours per day. Another thing I do is babysit for my cousin and sister. My sister has a four-year old and I babysit him Monday-Wednesdays and sometimes Saturdays for 5-10 hours a day. My cousin has a four-month-old and I babysit him Mondays and Tuesdays for 2-3 hours each day. My duties are to watch them, make sure they do not hurt themselves, and feed them. Since my nephew is growing up, I take about 30 minutes to one hour to teach him things to get him prepared for

My family and I moved to Utah when I was six-years-old. I did not know one word of English until I started first grade. My mother is single with four children. She left her life in Mexico in search of a better quality of life in Utah for us. We have always struggled financially due to my mother single-handedly supporting us. My mother, however, works day and night to pull us out of poverty. As much as my mother wishes she could pay for our education, circumstances will not permit her. It was a rocky road for my family to start all over from scratch, but together as a family we stuck together and overcame it. I feel that overcoming the challenges of moving to a new country has proven to me that I am capable of achieving anything that I am willing to fight for. My older brother and sister did not follow the right path, which led them to grow up too fast and not finish high school. Because of the things that they have been through, my twin-brother and I have learned from their mistakes. My older brother and sister are negative towards us, they believe since they weren't able to graduate high school and go to college, we can’t either. But my brother and I will prove them wrong. My siblings have impacted me in many ways, because of their mistakes, I want to do better. I want to be the first to graduate and go to college. To prove that stereotypes of Hispanics do not define who we are; we can make a difference. And, I