My name is Laura Valentina Vasquez Pastrana. I was born in a small town named Soacha, which is located next to the capital of my country Bogotá. I am the oldest daughter from a family of two girls and her parents.
At the age of 16, I fought for my dreams to become an international student in the United States and leave my house to make my dreams come true. I chose it because since I was little I always wanted to study in the U.S. In Colombia, we don’t have colleges after high school so when I came here for the first time I was looking to apply to a 4 year university instead of a college. My goals are to become a good engineer with a lot of humanity and be able to help people who need it with all my mechanical skills., and make life easy for people.
College has been so expensive to pay, even though I know that I signed up for this, I never expected it to be so expensive that I had to get two jobs at the same time. My family helped me till the moment that they started to have troubles in the economy of the country, and because of the money exchange from pesos to dollars. If an in-state student pays $1,500, I pay $4,500 for the same classes, with the same teacher, and with the same material. I have, after realizing that my family couldn’t afford my tuition and also pay for my sister’s high school in Colombia. I decided to stop telling them of my need for money and just tell them that I have been getting enough to pay for my education. But it has been completely difficult to do it. I think if the first two years of college were free, it would be amazing with less stress and better results. We would just have to focus on classes and nothing else. My peers would be grateful for the opportunity to get free college.
I work at the Diversity & Equity Center as a dreamer navigator. I help all kinds of students, focusing on the success of the undocumented students in their first year of college. I know many students who have been trying to get jobs and support their families, but because of their legal status, they are afraid to make their voices heard. A program that includes all kinds of students regardless of their status would be such a great opportunity, that way students can afford education and also have a good life, a good job, and a community.
Laura Vazquez, Everett