Before my College Summit Experience, not only did I think I couldn’t make it to college but I also thought that I wasn’t college material. Being born to Dominican Immigrants and being raised in the heart of Washington Heights, I was immediately exposed to drugs and violence which affected me deeply. I lost my father to the streets, the drugs that he sold, and his incarceration. At the age of 15, I had no role model. Imagine a teenager without a role model, living with a single mother in the Bronx, surrounded by drugs, violence, and gangs. It’s no surprise that I got sucked into all that nonsense. I almost dropped out of High School my junior year because of all the problems I was going through; A sick mother, an incarcerated father, two brothers without me by their side and an educational system where a young adolescent teenager like me are designed to fail.

My junior year was the pitfall of my whole High School career. That was until College Summit came into my life. Even though I wasn’t top in my class and wasn’t the best behaved student, I had potential and College Summit saw that and brought that out of me. College Summit came into my life when I most needed it. College Summit became my role model and my stepping stone towards the future. College Summit without a doubt changed my life for the better, by providing me with the tools and encouragements as well as the influences I needed to see the light to MY FUTURE.

At my workshop at Eastern Connecticut State University (ECSU) in 2007, I underwent a mental development. When I say mental development, I mean transforming what I thought was acceptable and attainable in my life. I reprogrammed not only my attitude but my outlook to expect that I would reach college and help others get there as well. Because of College Summit, am I entering my sophomore year at City College (CCNY), and I’m also creating opportunities that are helping me now and later, not only my future but my two brothers and my mom’s future as well. I am now my two younger brother’s new role model, the one I wish I had when I was growing up. Because if I made it, I know and will make sure that they make it. Not long ago was I a lost soul on the blunt streets of NYC, and look at me now, Interning in the New York College Summit Office and an Alumni Leader with two workshops this summer at YALE UNIVERSITY.

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