about 2000 people
Ah mi familia well my family where to start
Es muy grande it's really big typical mexican
family
I got 35 cousins on one side and 43 on the
other
Mi mama has a family of I think she has
11 brothers and sisters
Mi papi son una familia de diez. So he has
ten brothers and sisters
Um, my dad's side of the family
Is fortunately here all of them are here
My dad has one sister in Los Angeles
and then my mom's side of the family
She's like my second mom here it's actually very funny my mom's side of the family
Uh the shortest one in her family and then
all my uncles are tall
They are like six foot and then my dad's
side of the family
He's the tallest one and he only reaches
me up to my ear
So my mom will always tell me
So yeah that's my family there and then
Uh my dad's side of the family looks a lot
more legit like your typical Mexican
I never really thought I'd see them again
But um it transitioned well just cause
I knew my dad's side of the family was here
I had family here tenia familia aqui
I would watch cartoons and I wouldn't notice
anything
Um I went to kinder I went I ended up going
to
Yeah I ended up starting out in first grade
I think
I believe over in Posen Illinois which is
where we started out
My parents took me there I was really nervous
I mean at first I did have an accent I didn't
really know English
I didn't know I was illegal
The language barrier growing up was a little
bit difficult
Just because I would go to the doctors with
mi mama
I was afraid to translate some things because
I almost felt like shouldn't you be doing
that
So definitely the roles growing up
It was uh a little bit I would say
A little bit more difficult for me than
My younger siblings cause I was the one that
knew both languages fluently
They're like
our support that we go to everyday
Family is just so
important
Armando youre going be expecting that
But definitely something that I thought when I came here
I remember when I came here that people were
just so nice and so
I didn't know what Financial Aid was
They weren't frustrated with my parents
They went step by step by step and explained
everything
The admissions counselor who would go over
he was just so helpful
I mean he would talk to my parents
I would definitely look into Financial Aid
One thing that I didn't know about Valpo
Is that um or the financial aid that wasn't
explain to me very clearly
So it's like, and she explained that to
me
It's like you're on a treadmill
It's like you're on a treadmill
You're not really going anywhere you're
kind of stuck
Talking to other students about my activities
here
To first generation students and making them
feel welcome
With LIVE even though sometimes we swayed
away
We came back we definitely making them
Making them feel sure that Valpo is here to
help
Here to help you even though sometimes along
the way
The translation gets wrong or you feel like
you're not really accepted
They are here to help you
It's just the way people just don't know
And if you let them know people will start
to care
