The Willow Glen Resident

Photograph by Skye Dunlap

Driven: 'We showed them,' Martha Herrera (right) says of herself and Sylvia Reyes, Broadway High School seniors and mothers who are going to college despite people saying they'd never make it.

Motivated high school students honored for reversals of fortune

'They've really turned their lives around,' says board member of Glen Kiwanis Club

By Rebecca Wallace

As articulate Broadway High School seniors Sylvia Reyes and Martha Herrera talk about their lives, each one nodding in agreement with the other from time to time, it becomes clear how much they have in common.

Sylvia and Martha are both 17-year-old mothers whose early days in high school were marked by abysmal grades and trouble. Now they are college-bound, with respective grade point averages of 3.9 and 3.8.

The two, along with 11 other students at San Jose Unified School District high schools, received $500 Turn-Around Scholarships from the Kiwanis Club of Willow Glen Sunrisers at a May 6 luncheon at Lou's Village restaurant. Guests included SJUSD Superintendent Linda Murray and Willow Glen school board member Carol Myers; donors included Leo M. Shortino, Helen Accinelli-Lane and Andy Lane.

Matt Milbert and Monisha Jackson of Broadway were also honored, as was Evan Lassiter of Willow Glen High School.

"What these kids have done in the face of their backgrounds is phenomenal, really. They've really turned their lives around," says Kiwanis board member Harold Bounds. "You can tell by talking to them; they're very serious."

Martha says the ceremony was very moving: "Man, I cried. I just started remembering everything that had happened."

And that is a lot. After stints at Willow Glen, Lincoln and Yerba Buena high schools, Martha finished her freshman year with a 1.0 GPA. "I got pregnant at 15 and dropped out for a semester," she says. "Then I came to Broadway in January of '96, and I changed a lot. I came to school every day." She got involved in the school's Young Mothers group and enrolled daughter Chantal in free child care there.

Martha got certified as a medical secretary and began doing volunteer work with the San Jose Medical Group. In addition, she is president of the school's Key Club. She had wanted to be a policeman at first, but now aspires to be a teacher in a bilingual program and plans to attend San Jose City College and transfer to a four-year college, she says.

Both she and Sylvia cite teacher Lauretta Del Curto from the Young Mothers program as one of the reasons things changed for the better. "She gets on our case all the time," Martha says with a grin. "I never used to come to school on time, but in Young Mothers, if you come late, you have to go back home. It's hard, but you learn. We have to learn some way."

Sylvia got F's in 10th grade and ditched class, then got pregnant at 14. When her daughter, Monica, got sick, she didn't go back to school for a while until she enrolled at Broadway. Her favorite class was math.

"I noticed that I could make it at this school; teachers were really behind me, helping me," she says. She will go to San Jose City College, then transfer to a four-year school and get a nursing degree--the first member of her family to go to college, she says.

Both say they'll use the scholarship money for college. Sylvia adds, "If I don't use it, I'll keep it for my daughter's school."

The two also speak at other schools about their experiences at Broadway.

"People think when you have a kid, you can never be somebody," Martha says.

Sylvia nods. "A lot of people say, 'You're Mexican, you have a baby--' "

" 'You're a woman--' " Martha adds.

" 'You're not going to make it; you have to stay home,' " Sylvia finishes. "But we're here, and you can make it."

Martha adds triumphantly, "We showed them."

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