Despite the challenges of not being able to speak English, moving to a new country and the pandemic, senior Jesus T. is geared up and ready to head to one of a handful of prestigious colleges where he’s already been accepted — including Augustana, Marquette and Lake Forest College.
A College Bound Opportunities scholar, treasurer of the Student Council, member of the National Honor Society, regular food bank volunteer, admin at a charter school as part of the work-study program and a strong force on the soccer team, Jesus has traveled a long way from Jalisco, Atotonilco el Alto Jalisco, Mexico where he grew up.
A strong student in Mexico, Jesus’ parents decided when he was 14 that he would have a brighter future if he moved to Waukegan to live with his cousins and attend CRSM where they were enrolled.
For Jesus, the 2,000-mile trek was both disappointing and a new start. Just weeks after the freshman in high school moved here and applied to CRSM, his aunt told him, that though he showed lots of promise, CRSM did not have any openings in the upcoming sophomore class. His language barrier also was prohibitive. Jesus could read but could not speak English. “I was devastated,” he says. “I had left everything I knew, my family, my friends, my town, my lifestyle, to move to my aunt’s.”
Noemi,” Cuesta, Director of Admissions, says she remembers seeing “so much promise in Jesus.” She encouraged him to stay in Waukegan, attend Waukegan High School, study hard, master his language skills and reapply to CRSM.
“It was a really tough decision, but after analyzing it, I decided the best thing for me to do was to stay in Waukegan and put in a lot of effort in order to accomplish my goals,” he says.
Jesus continued to persist.
At Waukegan High School, he was thrown into a sea of sophomores who had already bonded as friends their freshman year and into the bi-lingual program where students “basically just spoke Spanish.” He pleaded with and convinced his academic counselor to put him in regular English-speaking classes. “I wanted to challenge myself, to go for it.”
Passionate about staying connected to CRSM, he volunteered many of his after-school hours in the CRSM parking lot packing boxes of food into cars during the Northern Illinois Food Bank pop-up distributions.
Armed with top grades after learning to speak English, Jesus was accepted to CRSM the second semester of his sophomore year.
Then COVID-19 hit. The dream of marching into the glitzy bright-colored former K-Mart-turned-high school was dashed and replaced by a virtual ZOOM reality from the kitchen in his aunt’s home. During this time, in addition to schooling, the soccer team and his corporate work-study job, Jesus also worked two part time jobs in landscaping and construction to pay for his room and board and living expenses.
“My father always told me ‘I want you to be someone who can do the desk job, but also comfortable at working in the fields and getting your hands dirty,” says Jesus.
This May Jesus is slated to graduate on the honor roll in AP classes. He’s also waiting to hear from Notre Dame, Northwestern University and the University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign.
He plans to major in business and someday be in management or helm his own company. He’s keenly aware that perspective is everything. “I’ve learned to never lose my focus on my final goal,” he says. “Life is not easy, but the more times you fail means the more times you are trying really hard to succeed. They’re your dreams, and you have to go for them.”
Jesus says he knows firsthand what it must feel like to be a Forrest Gump kind of guy. But like Forrest, Jesus’ mother and father assured him miracles do happen. “And I learned they do,” he says.