Beyond completing your AA Degree, what goals have you set for yourself?

Beyond completing my AA Degree–and release on parole–I have major life goals that I would like to meet within a time frame of twenty years. I would like to rebuild and expand the family business, attain financial security for me and my elderly parents, establish an irrevocable endowment fund, earn a Master’s Degree, and retire in Peru.

The family businesses–in floral retail sales and wedding and event planning–was established in 1988. After my departure in 1999, the company has struggled to compete as a brick and mortar business. In todays digital world, it needs to upgrade and expand its retail operations online, but my elderly parents need my help to accomplish this transition and expansion. Financial security is critical long-term goal that will provide for me.

 

What has been the most challenging part about being a college student?

It was challenging to set aside remnants of my past and of my insecurities. I had a bad habit of keeping score. Although my father is white, I was born with my mother’s dark Peruvian skin. While attending elementary school, I discovered that I was perceived differently by most of my white teachers because of my dark indigenous features. No matter how hard I worked or how well I performed, I was never good enough. I had to work twice as hard as the other students and this meant keeping score.

Today, grades and points don’t matter anymore. Learning is more important to me than how I rank among other students. In fact, the moment I stopped keeping score, my grades actually improved! I am hyper-focused on learning and how the lessons can improve my life, regardless of the grade or score my instructor writes on the paper. I developed a love of learning just for the sake of learning.

 

What are you passionate about?

In general, I am passionate about equality, learning, and community building. When it comes to equal treatment and equal access to things like higher education, employment opportunity, and fair housing practices, the United States has made great strides, but more work must be done. No country should claim to be the land of opportunity if it treats half of its people unfairly. After more than two centuries, the U.S. still has a significant gender divide, racial inequity, and a racially based distribution of wealth.

Nothing brings a community together like finding solutions to major problems: from cleaning up abandoned commercial properties, to sprucing up a community center, to getting roads paved and street lights fixed. When people feel that they have a stake in their communities, it wakes up something in their hearts that refuses to ignore problems they have an ability to resolve.

 

What are some words of wisdom, congratulations, or encouragement that you’d like to share with your fellow graduates?

Accept personal responsibility for your life, sow seeds of good will, and choose to reduce your suffering. Your choices help create the outcomes and experiences of your lives. Successful people often make wiser choices than people who struggle. While at San Quentin, I learned that we have all had lapses of judgement and faltered. But in every one of those times, it was an opportunity to learn and develop resiliency…Byron Katie once said, “Reality is always the story of the past, and what I love about the past is — it’s over.”

Help someone everyday. We all have unique talents and gifts that can help the next person find his or her own. There is no greater gift to humanity than that of soothing another’s pain.

“Most people think people who are incarcerated are ignorant, hardened criminals with no feelings. I see that incarcerated people are people who are unfortunate in the area of pro-social skills. Our parents didn’t have the best knowledge or education and they did the best they could. This could happen to anyone. And it has happened to everyone. When you know better, you do better. That’s why education is the key to freedom. I don’t have the chains of ignorance or violence anymore — even though I’m incarcerated, I feel free.”

“I served in the US Navy from 1973 to 1979, which included the final days of the Vietnam War (the evacuation of Saigon and the Mayaguez rescue). When I returned to the US, I really wasn’t welcomed like those who served before me. For many years after being incarcerated for my crime I had no sense of purpose. But in the late 80s, this changed when veterans groups were allowed to be formed within prisons. I’ve been involved ever since. For the most part, incarcerated veterans are forgotten — out of sight, out of mind. For those of us who served our country in the military in one form or another, we deserve to be recognized for that service. So today I feel good when men in here thank me for my service, and I will always try to help my fellow veterans however I can.”

“The Prison University Project’s classes gave me a strong foundation and taught me to view everything through a different lens. This foundation shows up in my everyday life. In magazine articles, papers I read, essays, in conversations, in politics. Now I can join in on the conversation because I have an idea about where people are coming from. When I’m reading a newspaper article, I can see how smaller perspectives funnel into larger ones. I can see subtle dynamics playing out in the argumentation in the article. I see the mechanics of writing in a way I hadn’t previously understood. I have a new tool set and a new lens through which to view this kind of dialogue. Every time I break through and understand something challenging I get a sense of accomplishment.”

“Prior to being institutionalized, I felt that prison would be the last place to find one’s blessings. However, the Prison University Project has been just that, a blessing. The staff opened students’ eyes, and my own to my many flaws. In my case, my flawed parenting skills. Child Psychology changed my eternal connection to my children; it gave me tools to see deep-rooted cultural problems that have existed through generations of my family tree, to see where I fell off the tracks with my children. More importantly, it showed me how to get back on track. I realized I had been practicing the same ideology on my kids that my father had practiced on me. I wrote letters to all of my children. There was a time that my children did not know how to feel about me. Now, they aren’t scared of me like I was of my father. Today I am identified as father and grandfather. The healing started with three words, I love you, words that I never was able to use comfortably before.”

“Education gives you a chance to demystify your life experiences, to articulate things that have happened to you, and to understand how your socialized beliefs are not really beliefs; they’re just what you learned. Understanding socialization has greatly impacted my growth and led to rapid maturation. I have resolved an identity crisis, and developed a fluid understanding of relationships with friends, family, and adversaries. I have better and elevated tolerance. The self-realization and reflection was like a snowball rolling down a snow-covered hill — it wasn’t a sudden revelation, it was subtle, a process. It all galvanized. When I realized I had arrived someplace new, it was an aha moment on a neurological and spiritual level.”

“Don’t be in a hurry to have all the material things in this life. Be happy and content with what you have. Know that when you earn something, through your own hard work and effort, it will be more valuable than something given to you or stolen. Intentionally hurting others is the continuation of the cycle in which you have been trapped, but you can spring yourself from the trap by being kind. Stay young at heart, be alive, go out of the house every day, dance, sing, enjoy your youth, love who you want to love and hope that they love you back. Don’t forget to be good to others, even when it pains you. No good can come of violence; take your aggression out in a positive way whenever possible. Stay humble and do what feels good and bring honor to your family and yourself.”

“I want people to understand that, although I committed a crime, I have looked at my life and my choices and have made a sincere effort to better myself. There is a lot of self-evaluation in prison and, more times than not, a better person leaves than the one who entered. If this journey has shown me anything it is that education never stops. I intend to keep learning for the rest of my life. We have reached the last rung on this ladder but it is only one level. The sky is vast and our untapped potential has no bounds. When, not if, we go home, we have to be the example to those we want to save from having to learn their lessons the hard way, the way we did. Our lives mean something. We have not allowed our minds to be idle; we have exercised our brains and now, our brains demand more. Let’s give it to them.”

“I’d like to think that after every class I left a positive impression on everyone and helped create a healthy environment for learning. It was never just about my education, but also about how I could help others become the best they could be. I’d like to think I’m an example of what a diligent student looks like. The lack of education is what sends people on a destructive path. To incoming students, I tell them to take advantage of this opportunity and really apply themselves and get all they can get out of the education — each and every class. Rise above just getting by and really apply yourself. The experience ingrains new habits you might find helpful in other areas of your life. Let this be a beginning.”