Dreamer With Dream Of Being A Doctor Accepted To Columbia University

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

Héctor Sánchez Pérez does not remember how he crossed the border between Mexico and the United States with the help of coyotes. Nothing unusual if he was just 3 months old and came to California in the arms of his parents in search of a better life. "My dad had a dream of going to college to be an engineer," says the 23-year-old from Oaxaca, Mexico. "But his family was very large and he did not [fulfill] it."

Settled in the town of Chiriaco Summit, his mother was a waitress and her father as an electrician, and they had two more children. Sánchez's dreams were also great and protected by his good grades and state law he entered the renowned University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) to study biology, even without papers.

In those days, then-President Barack Obama announced the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. "In 2012 I applied," he says. "It was a huge opportunity, a very big relief."

While Congress debated whether boys like Sánchez remained in the country, he began working at a clinic for the homeless. "Héctor is one of those students who worked tirelessly and compassionately to serve the most vulnerable people," said Michael Prelip, UCLA professor and president of community health sciences and project supervisor. "He is an extraordinary young man, who despite his multiple challenges has come out ahead."

Working with homeless people was "the experience I have learned the most from," Sánchez says. “She [taught] me to have compassion, to understand the circumstances of others. I want to help as many people as possible, especially immigrants."

In 2017, the young man was accepted into five elite universities - including Yale and Columbia - to pursue his master's degree. Facing huge costs, he raised funds through the GoFundMe donation fundraising platform and entered Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health in New York.

In September, President Donald Trump announced the end of DACA, jeopardizing the future of nearly 800,000 enrolled in the program. But Sánchez-who wants to be a doctor-does not stop. “I haven't even thought about the possibility of being deported. I will leave alone if they take me out,”he concludes. "I will fight and move on. I'm not going to stay in the shadows."