Circle de Luz

At the end of my junior year in college, I attended graduation to see off my friends that were a year older than me. When the college president read off the name of one of my friends, a first generation African-American student from a small South Carolina town, an eruption came from the crowd, a surprise at an occasion that usually only drew polite claps at our college. My eyes scanned the crowd until I saw my friends’ family up and clapping, declaring their excitement over his graduation. I cried.

He and I worked together in a summer program and had become close friends. He was from a large family and an older brother of his was in prison. An incredibly gifted writer, when his brother left, his talking was interrupted by stutters, self-consciousness and grief taking root. And, yet, he persevered, his brightness and kindness far more noticeable than his stuttering ever was, although it took him a while to realize that.

That summer, we worked together again, and I told him how I felt watching his whole family cheer. He was the first to go to college, and when he walked across that stage, he carried all of them—all of their hopes and sacrifices, struggles and triumphs– with him. A year later, I did the same thing with my family—just the five of us total since my parents’ roots were in Puerto Rico—at my side. I remember how I wanted that moment to affirm for my parents the difficult choice they made to stay in the United States and allow me to be educated here. I wanted every difficult moment that they had experienced, every unkind word that had been said to them, every sacrifice to somehow be acknowledged and outweighed in that moment. I walked across the stage that day not just proud of the decisions and choices I had made to get myself to that place, but ever grateful to the people who had helped me get to that place, my parents most of all.

I was reminded of those two college graduations the other day when an e-mail from a woman who participated in the research for Hijas popped up on my computer screen.

She had just heard about Circle de Luz and this is what her e-mail said: I will be graduating from college at the age of 34 with my BA in six weeks, the first in my family. I am feeling many things as this nears, but mostly I am feeling the need to return the blessing. I cannot think of a better way than through Circle de Luz. My heart feels full to know about this program. Thank you.

When I read her e-mail, my eyes brimmed with tears at the way that not just individuals are changed by the power of education, but at the way education empowers whole families. The greatest gift I was given as a girl was the unselfish decision my parents made to stay here in this country and allow me to be educated. I am not sure that I can ever repay them for a lifetime spent without their parents or siblings at their sides, for the way that some people did not make it easy for them, for the discomfort of living in another world and another language. And so, with the Circle, I do the only thing I know how, I embrace my family with my motion, join hands with those around me, and prepare to help a future generation of young women know the joy and power of crossing that stage with their literal and figurative families cheering for them from the wings.

– Rosie Molinary, Circle de Luz Founder

…Lately I’ve been dreaming big – REAL BIG! I woke up the other morning and decided that I would like to go to graduate school to earn an MBA. On that very same morning I also decided I wanted to complete both my first Marathon and Ironman Triathlon before I turn 30. One might say my very recent 28^th birthday might have some significance to the urgency of my BIG dreams and maybe they’re right. Maybe for the past 28 years I’ve been getting away with the status quo and in my 28^th year I’ve only just realized that my potential for greatness far exceeds the status quo. Could that really happen? Could you just wake up one day and realize your true worth, your market value to society?

I remember when I graduated college, I ruled out perfectly good job opportunities because I wasn’t “good” at math. Only after working and learning on the job skills did I realize that I was actually very good at math. The concepts and rules made sense when someone taught me their “real-life” application. The jobs I had looked at before had months of training associated with them so I ruled them out based on my ability to learn. I didn’t believe in myself, but the irony is I learned it anyways. There must be something to this epiphany, and it has nothing to do with my 28^th birthday …

You know what it is? It has to do with the people in my life now who have encouraged me. Not to say I didn’t have encouragement and support growing up, but it wasn’t like it is now. You remember what it was like to be a kid. To want to grow up and be an adult as soon as possible, but how many of us really understood what that meant? I knew I was going to go to college, but I didn’t know why and I definitely didn’t know which school. And you guessed it, I ruled out perfectly good schools that I was well qualified to attend, because I didn’t think I would get in.

I like to think that if I had someone, a mentor perhaps, when I was in middle school or high school that I would have pushed myself harder because there was someone telling me, specifically, that they believed in me. That I could actually do the things I doubted in myself.

If you had someone in your life like this, then you are an incredibly lucky person. You also realize the impact this person has had on your life and as a result, the success you have today. For me, I’ve only recently benefited from someone like this. Truthfully there are handfuls of people who have taught me to dream big. They have encouraged me when I felt unqualified. They have supported me when I have felt overwhelmed, and they have inspired me to do great things that I didn’t think I was capable of. And I am forever grateful to be this lucky. But a part of me wishes this could have happened a long time ago, when I was just kid, when I had the guts to dream big, but I didn’t have the heart.

I have another big dream. To make sure I’m a role model, a mentor, a person of endless encouragement for someone like me, when I was a kid. And the best part about this dream is that I know it could be really hard, but I also know I have the guts and the heart to do it – REAL BIG!

– Anna Freuler, Circle de Luz Board Member

I am a part of Circle de Luz because of Anahi and because of Erika. Seven years ago I began to tutor Latino children with Amigos de Cristo in Huntersville, NC. Anahi was one of my first students. She was nine, with long dark hair and a heart-stopping beauty. Her family spoke no English, and she was struggling with trying to pass the fourth grade writing test. She always had bright, new school supplies, a neat notebook, and carefully written work to share. She loved school and had dreams of being a teacher. Anahi went on to middle school, and I stopped seeing her. Last year, I saw her little sister and asked about her, thinking she was in high school. Anahi is not in school, she said, she is living with her husband and her baby. Anahi was 16. It broke my heart.

Erika was the first Latina child I taught in Cornelius, NC. Her family was one of the first Mexican families in the area. Erika was an average, conscientious student who was often called upon to translate for her mother. While I had her, she had major family problems. And when she was in middle school, she and her mother and brother fled to Texas from her abusive father. Five years later came an unexpected letter, thanking me for supporting her. She was finishing in the top 10 in her class in Texas with a full scholarship to the University of Texas. Another letter came last week. Erika is finishing her degree in biology, headed to medical school and is engaged to be married.

Two bright-eyed little girls full of hope and two very different endings. Circle de Luz has the potential to tell more stories like Erika’s, and less like Anahi’s. I feel blessed to be a part of that effort.

– Rosemary Klein, Circle de Luz Board Member