Migrant education pays it forward

Ana Llamas, Karen Santana, Ariana Montero and Luciana Mosqueda exemplify the many ways in which the Migrant Education Project pays it forward. All four young women are visible and active in Lake County public schools, dedicated to helping the students who need it most. All are products of the Migrant Education Program of Butte, Mendocino, and Lake counties, administered through Yuba College. All are the children of migrant field workers.

With its mission statement clear: “Our migrant children … they are our only hope … like seedlings they have been sown in your schools … it is our wish that they blossom into harvests of hope.”

The program’s goals are twofold: 1) Provide direct instructional tutorial services to increase migrant student academic achievement through a cadre of trained college tutors; and 2) Develop a cadre of future bilingual, bicultural credentialed teachers that will be better equipped to work with migrant children.

Llamas, Santana, Montero and Mosqueda all have been direct recipients of the Migrant Education Program. Each of their parents made it clear that they did not want their children to follow them into field work. They insisted that each of their offspring take full advantage of educational opportunities in the United States as a path to a better life.

For the past six years, Llams has been involved with the program, beginning with her freshman year at college. Desirous of becoming a school psychologist, Llamas wants “to work with kids who have experienced generational trauma and to show them a path forward.”

Born in El Salvador and fleeing during the lengthy civil war there, Llamas’ mother remembers the literal “smell of death” in her village. Once in the United States, having been admitted via political asylum, she worked in the fields many years, but was struck by a tractor several years ago and is permanently disabled.

Using a creative approach to discourage Llamas from fieldwork, her mother took her to work with her for one day when she was 10. Llamas recalls that experience as cementing her desire to do well in school and graduate from Lower Lake High School. Now, with her bachelor of arts degree only a year away, Llamas works for the Konocti Unified School District as a bilingual para-educator. As is the case in all Lake County school districts, Konocti has a large representation of students from migrant families who benefit greatly from the program.

To become a school social worker is Santana’s goal. A bilingual liaison, she came to the United States only five years ago, graduating from high school in honors course and entering college while still mastering English. Debating in Spanish, she was an award-winning debater from the start at Lower Lake.

A native of Jalisco, Santana’s father initiated the cumbersome legal immigration process 22 years ago. She remembers her entire family riding a bus for a full day and night to the consulate in Juarez for meetings with immigration officials. Now in her second year at Woodland College, Santana’s views herself and her migrant education program colleagues as role models for migrant students.

“We show them that they can succeed because we were just like them and we are succeeding. They identify with us because we look like them,” Santana said.

Both of Santana’s parents have moved from fieldwork to full-time positions as Konocti Unified School District custodians.

Mosqueda tutored migrant children in the Kelseyville and Lakeport school districts from 20142016 while a student at Mendocino College. She then transferred to San Francisco State where she gained her bachelor of arts degree in communication studies. She is currently the bilingual site secretary for the Konocti Unified School District.

“The migrant community is underserved in many areas, so if I can help a student with a math problem or help a parent with the enrollment process, it’s like uplifting the whole community, “Mosqueda said. “To this day, I see a majority of students I tutored walk across the state in a middle school or high school graduation, a huge milestone for migrant families.”

Stationed in Kelseyville, Montero tutors migrant students K-12 both virtually and in per son. Born in Michoacan, Mexico, Montero came to the United States at age 5. Having been chronically ill in Mexico, her health immediately improved in Lake County. While her father continues to work in the fields, he is a member of the United Farmworkers Union and has earned a position of responsibility.

Montero shares that her father’s message to her was to graduate from Kelseyville High School so she could be a cashier. Laughing, she saids, “I always knew I would graduate from high school and go to college, but not to be a cashier.” She is pursuing a dual major in accounting and teaching, with the hope of teaching middle school math and sponsoring Future Farmers of America. An avid participant of FFA at Kelseyville High School, Montero shyly notes, “I loved FFA and I was the FFA sweetheart in my senior year.”

— Submitted