In her own words
Veronica Avalos
I am a first-generation Mexican American female who is pursuing her master’s degree in social work to make an impact and to uplift my community. My parents are both immigrants and they both traveled here to the states when they were about 16- and 17-years old. My mother was able to overcome many barriers that she faced when she was coming over here, such as learning English within a year and finishing her high school education and graduating with high honors in high school. With this foundation I wanted to pursue higher education to be able to help those in my community. I live in Pacoima, which is a very underserved community, and I feel that by pursuing this degree I will be able to come back and make a stronger impact within my community and uplift those around me. Many times, we hear that the reasoning why people are going to school is to get out of the communities that they currently live in, however, I feel that we should be going to school and achieving higher education so that we can come back and give back to our communities. I know that with this degree, I will be able to make a very high impact. My personal goals are to achieve this dream of becoming a licensed clinical social worker and be able to give back to the Hispanic community that I belong to. More specifically, I want to work with the geriatric population, who I think are underserved and not represented as much as the other populations. I see myself being able to come back and hopefully work in hospice or in palliative care and really be able to bring that client focused treatment to the geriatric community and to their families.