Success Stories

A Job Corps Graduate Takes a Look Back

By Judge Sergio A. Gutierrez*

* This is an excerpt from Judge Gutierrez's remarks at an event held at the College of Southern Idaho. He currently serves on the Idaho Court of Appeals.

I was born in Mexico and brought to this country by my parents. They came in search of a new start, and the seeds they planted with that decision proved to bear, for me, the sweetest of fruits: the fruit of opportunity, the fruit of democracy, fruit whose juice now runs in my veins as surely as the blood of my ancestors.

My life was very different from the one we often associate with life in this country. The middle class was seemingly out of my reach. My father worked as a farm laborer in California's San Joaquin Valley, toiling long hours but still unable to afford even basic necessities. My mother's emotional health deteriorated. I was sent to live with my grandmother in New Mexico.

As I woke up day after day only to find myself, once again, sitting barefoot upon the dirt floor of my grandmother's shack-like home, I felt like life had dealt me some bad cards. I thought that I didn't have much going for me. But my unsophisticated and abjectly poor grandmother left me a most valuable gift: a love of learning. Grandmother taught herself to read, and then she taught me.

When Grandmother passed away, I returned to California at age 12 to live again with my parents, whose hardships had only worsened. I dropped out of school to find work in the fields to help my family survive.

My immaturity found its only outlet in my free time. I began to run around with an older crowd, hoodlums involved with criminal activity and drug abuse.

But an Anglo woman working at the job service office took an interest in me and introduced me to the Job Corps program. I began to feel a sense of self-confidence. I discovered that I had potential. I passed all my exams and became the first in my family to earn a GED.

I am proud to tell you that many of my dreams have since been realized - not because I am some sort of extraordinary person, but because I have enjoyed the support of so many people. I began to understand that although I was of Mexican ancestry, I was also American. That although I was poor in material possessions, I was rich with love and support.

Now I believe that the most important thing I can do, that we can do, is to provide this same kind of nourishment to the younger generation.

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Page last updated: Tuesday, July 28, 2009