Chain reaction

Gonzales family finds opportunity through Maricopa Colleges’ ACE program

Vivian’s journey

In 1988 Vivian Gon­za­les was a stu­dent at Camel­back High School in Phoenix, but she believed her future looked bleak.

“I didn’t think col­lege was for me,” says Vivian, now in her mid-30s and a suc­cess­ful career woman. “I thought it was just for smart kids that got per­fect grades and for rich peo­ple. It seemed impos­si­ble for me to imag­ine that col­lege was an option because I didn’t know one per­son who went to college.”

She still recalls the day she received an appli­ca­tion for the Mari­copa Achiev­ing a Col­lege Edu­ca­tion (ACE) pro­gram at South Moun­tain Com­mu­nity Col­lege. “I was unsure about apply­ing, but my mother encour­aged me to give it a try,” Gon­za­les says.  “I was very sur­prised to be accepted into a col­lege pro­gram. After start­ing ACE, my high school grades improved. I believed that if I was smart enough to go to col­lege, I should be doing well in high school.”

Like Vivian, many other stu­dents have ben­e­fited from the boost in self-esteem that often comes with aca­d­e­mic suc­cess. The Gon­za­les fam­ily knows; three women from the fam­ily have grad­u­ated from ACE and pur­sued higher education.

Vivian had accu­mu­lated 22 col­lege cred­its by the time she grad­u­ated from high school. She trans­ferred to SMCC and grad­u­ated with an Asso­ciate of Arts degree in geog­ra­phy. She was vale­dic­to­rian of her class. Dur­ing her time at SMCC, the ACE pro­gram afforded her another oppor­tu­nity that would lead to her even­tual career.

Her advi­sor encour­aged her to apply for a stu­dent job with the Bureau of Recla­ma­tion. There, she worked as a clerk in the pho­togram­met­ric divi­sion, work­ing with peo­ple mak­ing topo­graphic maps.

Vivian went on to grad­u­ate from Ari­zona State Uni­ver­sity with a B.A. in geog­ra­phy and was then hired as a car­tog­ra­pher by the Bureau of Recla­ma­tion. Today, she is a water resources plan­ner in the Pro­gram Devel­op­ment Divi­sion. She has been with the bureau for 20 years.

Now a con­fi­dent pro­fes­sional, Vivian says things were dif­fer­ent when she first joined ACE. “I didn’t have much self-esteem, espe­cially in regards to my edu­ca­tion. I devel­oped con­fi­dence in myself because there was some­body who believed in me.

“For the first time, I thought I was some­body and I could do what­ever I put my mind to.”

Mary­lyn goes to col­lege, too

Vivian’s sis­ter, Mary­lyn Wil­son, was a strug­gling high school stu­dent at Camel­back High.

“My fresh­man year of high school, I was a poor stu­dent, fre­quently ditch­ing class and mak­ing poor grades,” Mary­lyn explains. “My pri­or­i­ties were out­side of edu­ca­tion, and I lacked the self-confidence to see myself as an impor­tant and suc­cess­ful per­son well into the future.”

After Vivian joined ACE, Mary­lyn took notice of her sister’s sud­den blos­som­ing. “I admired the esteem of her being a full-blown, suc­cess­ful col­lege stu­dent with job offers and career options. For the first time, I saw there was a future out there that I could shape, and that col­lege would allow me the choices to shape it in a pos­i­tive way.”

Mary­lyn applied and was accepted into the ACE pro­gram. “After Vivian showed that it could be done, I began to find suc­cess in col­lege through the ACE pro­gram,” Mary­lyn recalls.

Like her sis­ter, Mary­lyn grad­u­ated with an asso­ciate degree from SMCC. She trans­ferred to Grand Canyon Uni­ver­sity and grad­u­ated with a bachelor’s degree in biol­ogy with a minor in chem­istry. She con­tin­ued her edu­ca­tion and attended Mid­west­ern University’s phar­macy school.

“As I stood on the stage at Jobing.com Arena in 2005 receiv­ing my Doc­tor of Phar­macy degree, I was very proud of my suc­cess and grate­ful that I was able to share it with the mem­bers of my fam­ily who had inspired me those many years before,” she says. “I felt over­whelmed at the start of col­lege, hav­ing just become a mother. But fresh from two years of the ACE pro­gram, I had received guid­ance and sup­port on how to be suc­cess­ful in college.”

Mary­lyn cred­its ACE coun­selors Stella Tor­res, Buddy Cheeks and Deb­bie Bies. “[They] believed in me and gave me the self-confidence to keep going. They taught me the essen­tial nonaca­d­e­mic skills, such as how to apply for finan­cial aid, look for schol­ar­ships, and sched­ule classes. They taught me good study skills and habits that helped me to bal­ance edu­ca­tion with the demands of life. Because of that help, I had made it, and I’m sure I couldn’t have with­out ACE.”

Mary­lyn also cred­its her instruc­tors, who prod­ded her to ful­fill her poten­tial. “Those pro­fes­sors showed me that my strengths were in math and sci­ence, which I’ve since made my life out of,” she says. “I’ve faced many bar­ri­ers and chal­lenges to edu­ca­tion, includ­ing the most chal­leng­ing of all: the feel­ing I had that I was not smart enough to be suc­cess­ful in col­lege. From hum­ble begin­nings to sin­gle moth­er­hood to poor self-esteem, the ACE pro­gram has helped me to over­come the chal­lenges of my young adult­hood and allowed me the free­dom to use edu­ca­tion to take con­trol of my own life.”

Mom goes back to school

The sis­ters’ mother, Lucy Gon­za­les, saw first­hand what ACE and a col­lege edu­ca­tion had done for her daugh­ters. The expe­ri­ence inspired her to go back to school, and just like her daugh­ters, she also grad­u­ated with an asso­ciate degree from SMCC. In fact, Lucy and Mary­lyn grad­u­ated in the same class.

“The ACE expe­ri­ence for our fam­ily has been a very pos­i­tive and reward­ing one,” says proud mom Lucy. “After Vivian grad­u­ated, Mary­lyn and I grad­u­ated together from SMCC, and how many moms can top that?”

She’s right.

Now the next gen­er­a­tion of the fam­ily is ben­e­fit­ing from the ACE pro­gram, and it has branched out to other mem­bers of their extended fam­ily. Vivian and Marylyn’s aunt Jona also grad­u­ated from SMCC.

“It caused a chain reac­tion that has affected my whole fam­ily,” Vivian says. “Now our chil­dren are going to ACE. My two daugh­ters, Brit­tany and Isa, and my nephew, Marylyn’s son Joseph, are attend­ing Glen­dale Com­mu­nity College’s ACE Plus program.”

Tor­res, direc­tor of the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges’ ACE pro­gram, has seen Vivian’s expe­ri­ence dupli­cated hun­dreds of times over the past 20 years.

“The ACE pro­gram is designed to reduce dropouts among at-risk high school stu­dents and tran­si­tion them to col­lege,” Tor­res says. “We’ve served more than 11,000 stu­dents since we started.”

The cri­te­rion for accep­tance into the ACE pro­gram is also unique: high school sopho­mores who are the first in their fam­ily to attend col­lege, who work 10 to 30 hours a week to help the fam­ily, are from single-parent house­holds, are mem­bers of an under­rep­re­sented group, or endure such envi­ron­men­tal fac­tors as fos­ter care, live in tem­po­rary hous­ing, or are a teen parent.

Selected stu­dents are enrolled con­cur­rently in their high school and one of the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges. They are taught by Mari­copa fac­ulty in all of their ACE col­lege courses, have to meet pre­req­ui­site require­ments for all of their col­lege classes, and must attend col­lege classes dur­ing the sum­mer and on Sat­ur­days dur­ing the fall and spring semesters.

Since 1994, 76 per­cent of all ACE stu­dents have gone on to college.

Tor­res believes the pro­gram works because “some­one out­side the fam­ily [from a col­lege set­ting] gives them affir­ma­tion that they can suc­ceed in col­lege. It works because we sup­port them every step of the way.”

ACE was estab­lished in 1987 at SMCC, and expanded to GCC in 1990. By 2006 all 10 of the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges had estab­lished an ACE pro­gram, and Rio Sal­ado Col­lege had started an Adult ACE pro­gram. Addi­tional ACE pro­grams — five Junior ACE pro­grams, ACE Puente (an online pro­gram), and an ACE Native Amer­i­can Ini­tia­tive —have also been established.

Each of the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges now has an ACE pro­gram with its own cur­ricu­lum focus, part­ner­ing with more than 80 high schools across the Valley.

It’s no longer a secret why the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges’ ACE pro­gram has been such a suc­cess. Just ask the Gon­za­les family.

“We have our next gen­er­a­tion of ACE stu­dents, my won­der­ful grand­kids attend­ing Glen­dale Com­mu­nity Col­lege,” Lucy says. “Their future looks bright because of this won­der­ful program.”

Mary­lyn agrees with her mom. “I feel like edu­ca­tion is the most impor­tant thing in the world, and I con­sider myself a stu­dent even now. The way I approached edu­ca­tion and the way I have accom­plished all of the edu­ca­tional and pro­fes­sional goals I have set for myself were skills taught to me by the ACE program.”

As for Vivian, she has been so moved by ACE that she has spear­headed efforts at giv­ing back to the pro­gram, which is funded in part by the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges Foun­da­tion. As a mem­ber of the His­panic Coun­cil at the Bureau of Recla­ma­tion, she has helped raise more than $30,000 for the ACE program.

Vivian’s mes­sage to young­sters who don’t think they’re smart enough to attend college:

“I would like them to know they are just as good and as smart as any­body else. All you have to do is believe in your­self and try, because there are great pro­grams like the ACE pro­gram to assist you.”

ACE Facts

Achiev­ing a Col­lege Edu­ca­tion (ACE) is a scholarship-based, con­cur­rent enroll­ment pro­gram fea­tur­ing par­ent par­tic­i­pa­tion. High school stu­dents attend col­lege classes dur­ing the sum­mer, and on Sat­ur­days dur­ing the fall and spring semes­ters. Some facts:

• The first ACE Pro­gram was estab­lished in 1987 at South Moun­tain Com­mu­nity College.

• ACE serves more than 80 high schools in Mari­copa County. Tenth graders apply through their high school’s coun­sel­ing department.

• ACE stu­dents can earn up to 24 col­lege cred­its by the time they grad­u­ate from high school.

• 84 per­cent of ACE stu­dents grad­u­ate from high school.

• 76 per­cent of ACE stu­dents go on to college.

• ACE has 10 high school pro­grams, one adult pro­gram and five junior (middle-school) pro­grams. Each Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­lege offers an ACE program.

• ACE costs approx­i­mately $852 per year, per stu­dent. Schol­ar­ship funds are raised through the efforts of the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges Foun­da­tion, a non­profit orga­ni­za­tion that seeks con­tri­bu­tions from pub­lic and pri­vate sources includ­ing indi­vid­u­als, cor­po­ra­tions and other foundations.

For any ques­tions about ACE, con­tact ace.corp@domail.maricopa.edu.

To learn more about the Mari­copa Com­mu­nity Col­leges Foun­da­tion visit: http://www.maricopa.edu/foundation.