First-generation student Estefania Villicana, who will graduate Magna Cum Laude with
the Hartnell College Class of 2020, has a way of making her own momentum.
On Friday, she will receive her Associate in Arts in Social and Behavioral Sciences and Psychology and an Associate in Arts for Transfer in Sociology. She is the daughter of Jose Villicana and Maria Albanil, who came to Salinas from Mexico in 1999, and one of four children, including a brother who will start at Hartnell his summer.
In the fall, Villicana will attend the University of California, Los Angeles, where she plans to major in sociology and minor in education, followed by a master’s degree in education and a teaching credential in history.
Once she has completed her education, she intends to return to Salinas, with the goal of teaching at North Salinas High School, where she graduated in 2018.
Villicana has received $8,000 in scholarships from UCLA, and she will apply her $10,000-a-year Peggy and Jack Baskin Transfer Scholarship, which goes to high-achieving first-generation women UC students from low-income families. In addition, she learned in December that she was one of only six students across the country to receive the $1,000 AHSIE Seed to Tree Scholarship, and she also was a semi-finalist for the Cooke Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship.
She said she is grateful for all the support and encouragement she has received at Hartnell, particularly from TRiO Director Manuel Bersamin, who nominated her for multiple scholarships.
“The faculty here, a lot of them I can relate to because they grew up here or similar to a community like Salinas” she said. “Knowing that they were first-generation as well, it’s so easy to relate to them and build a connection with them, and see your future self in them, which is really encouraging.”
Villicana has been a scholar and scholarship recipient in Hartnell’s Women’s Education and Leadership Institute and has worked as a student ambassador in the Office of Equity Programs, assisting with the Salinas Valley Promise program and outreach to undocumented students, among other things.
She belongs to the Phi Theta Kappa honor society, has represented the Hartnell Psychology Club in student government and is student ally of UMOJA, an organization in support of African-American students. If that’s not enough, she also joined the revival of Hartnell’s intercollegiate swim-dive team in its premier season this spring.
Villicana said her interest in teaching history is inspired by a desire to give Latinx students like herself a confident pride in their own identity, something she said she gained at Hartnell – but not in high school.
“When I grew up here, I never got taught about people of color like me,” Villicana said. “I think that’s important to teach, because it shows people their roots, and you can’t grow as a tree without your roots.”