Miguel Sanchez: 0:10

Welcome to first gen 1 0 1. The podcast where first-generation graduates share their stories and career tips. I am your host Miguel Sanchez. In this episode, Nelson Rodriguez. Shares invaluable insights on mentorship, finding balance and turning struggles and to triumphs. A must listen for anyone passionate about supporting first-generation students. Welcome to another episode of the 1st Gen 101 podcast. We have Nelson Rodriguez. Nelson, thank you for being here today. Thanks for having me. Nelson, tell me about your background.

Nelson Rodriguez: 0:50

I'm first generation born here in the United States, in North New Jersey of Salvadorian immigrants. My mom and my dad. And so I'm the first, they're first born and the first of two brothers. Education was always the most important thing in the house. Like I, I didn't even have chores growing up because my chore was to come home and get good grades. Like a lot of immigrant families, that was my job. I remember distinctly when I first started working at McDonald's, my dad was very upset because he didn't think I would have time to work and continue getting good grades. So I was an honor society student for all four years of high school. I also played sports and was involved in different clubs in school, just so I could have a social life along with all the studying that I had to do. But then I also wanted to make money. There was a McDonald's in my neighborhood and a lot of my friends were working there, so I went to work there, but my dad was upset because it wasn't a good job, it was a bad job to study. That's the mentality that's been in my life as I've been going from different locations, different careers, and getting different degrees.

Miguel Sanchez: 1:45

And at what point in your high school experience, Did you decide I want to go to college and what was your goal? What, how did you see yourself in the future in terms of a career?

Nelson Rodriguez: 1:59

Yeah. So I, I didn't have it again. First generation, first born. I didn't really have a choice of not going to college. My parents were very adamant from when I was in grade school to high school that education was going to be my way of succeeding in this country, which is what they wanted for me and my brother. As soon as freshman year hit. Started talking to my guidance counselor. What do I do to get into college? And I was already in the National Honor Society. Instead of having a double gym their senior year, I took an AP Chemistry and AP Bio class because I was like, okay, this, I have good grades, but I need better grades. And so that, that's, And looking back, I could have just taken one AP class and had a lot of fun my senior year. But, in that mentality of not knowing who to ask, and my guidance counselor didn't really say yes or no to me about taking these AP courses, but knowing that I could have taken just maybe AP science or AP, biology, as opposed to both these, very intense courses on my senior year. And then all my friends are like having double gym. I'm going back into, the classroom to study, again, gave me a good, great foundation, but if I could go over and tell a high school student, enjoy, find balance,

Miguel Sanchez: 3:04

how was the college selection process? How did you make your list? How did you decide which colleges you were applying to? And how did you eventually choose your college?

Nelson Rodriguez: 3:17

Yeah, so neither one of my parents has a degree. My mom graduated up to fifth grade because then she had to start working. And my dad didn't finish high school. The process of them helping me was just great. Getting on me to remind me, did you apply for this school? Did you apply for that school? Have you heard back from this school? And this is, I'm a little older. So this is before the internet, before email. So everything came in the mail. I would have to tell my parents, we have to wait for the mail to come in. There's no other way to tell if I've been accepted or not. My friends were also first generation. So we didn't have big lists. We didn't have an opportunity to see colleges outside of New Jersey. I knew about Ivy leagues, but I never thought of it. Never crossed my mind. I got lucky. And my guidance counselor put me in a recruitment room for Montclair State University's pre med program. It was about a handful of us and the recruiter came down who I'm actually friends with now, Ms. Serena Smith at Montclair State University. She came in and talked about the pre med program and it focused a lot on first gen students who wanted to go into pre med. And they offered me an interview and I took the interview. When they offered me the opportunity, they offered it to me before the school even offered me a mission into Montclair state. I just said, yes, because I was like, oh, okay, this is easy. I just talked about myself for 10, 15 minutes. They talked to my mom and they accepted me into the pre med program. So why am I going to apply for other programs when I already knew that? Not knowing any better, I wasn't able to compare financial aid packages, which is what I tell college students now. You may have your dream school. But financial aid packages are important and you can always go to your dream school for graduate school or for your doctorate. If that's the avenue you want to take. Always compare your financial packages because I did get a better financial package from a different school after accepting Montclair State, but I love Montclair State. I don't have my Montclair State mug here because I wanted to promote my current job, which is Sarah Lawrence College, but I have Montclair State everywhere. I'm very happy with the decision I made to go to that particular institution. I ended up also working there for a couple of years and getting my master's from Montclair State.

Miguel Sanchez: 5:11

It sounds like you had people who helped you. With the selection process, which made it much easier. And so now you start college and you're in your first semester. What were some of the biggest challenges you encountered as a first generation student?

Nelson Rodriguez: 5:29

Not being told when to wake up. It was a big challenge. When I stayed on campus I rarely slept. I came up raised in a very strict household where as 10 PM curfew. I remember one time my mom got mad at me because I was talking to a girl on the phone and it was like 10 30 and it was so embarrassing because she it was again. This was back then in the day when there was house phones and so she picked up the other line and said, that's what I do with me. I do with me yet. I'm like mom. No, don't do that. Don't do that. Luckily the girls laughed it off. But when I got to college, I didn't sleep. I slept in class, and so after a first semester of doing that, I righted the ship myself, realizing that I, need to focus a little bit more on this. Again, with the pre med program that I was in Montclair State, I did have an advisor. But being first gen, being a little hard headed, I didn't really go too much to my advising sessions, which I regret. I should have gone to more advising sessions than I missed, but it did help me again, in terms of knowing that I had help, I just didn't ask for it. But I always try to do things my own way, which is not what I tell first gen students to do, always ask for help. But I didn't do that. For me it was really, the difficult part was, again knowing when to turn off the fun part of college. And then when to ask for help, because there are people at the college that are getting paid through your tuition that are there to help you.

Miguel Sanchez: 6:46

I couldn't agree with you more on that advice. The heart of this podcast is to offer that advice. There are people who may not readily ask for help, but offering help here. Our goal is to reach as many people as we can. Speaking of help. Did you find mentors in college? How was the process of that mentorship? Did you have any, and how did that work out for you?

Nelson Rodriguez: 7:11

Yeah, so the director of the pre med program, Donna Lorenzo, was a great mentor of mine. She was also a Latina first gen student. She saw a lot of opportunities along with other students in the program. Whenever I needed to ask her a question, she was always there to answer it. Along with the recruiter Serena Smith and my advisor Ms. Washington. I still call her Ms. Washington. We were colleagues for 10 years, but I'll never call her by her first name. That shows the level of respect that I have for her, and the graciousness I have for the work they do. There were some professors that, While I was taking a class that mentored me a little bit, I have other professors that I still stay in contact now that were extremely helpful. I did leave the pre med program and went into psychology. There's a particular professor, Dr. Reagan, who, just opened up my eyes into the world of social services and helping other people. I still stay in contact with her to this day.

Miguel Sanchez: 8:01

One of the things we emphasize in this podcast is in college, you're going to pursue a degree, but equally important, you're going to build a network because you are going to interact with other people. So it's really important that, as Nelson mentioned, not only seek help during college, but also keep in touch with those people as you graduate and pursue other opportunities. One of the benefits of going to college is that you get to meet other people and it's important to keep those relationships. You mentioned graduate school a few times. Did you go to graduate school after undergrad and how was that process different? Then going to college,

Nelson Rodriguez: 8:47

I got my graduate degree, 11 years after my undergraduate degree, I started working during the summer of my freshman year, going into my sophomore year, a friend of mine told me about a nonprofit in the city of Norco, like I said, on federal, they were hiring college students and pay 10 an hour. So to help mentor in a program called the North Youth Leadership Project. And I was like, Oh, I can do that. I can, go help out kids and get paid 10 an hour. It's only a summer gig. That's not a problem. And I enjoyed it. I loved it. Casa San Pedro is one of the largest, larger nonprofit organizations in North New Jersey. I come back a second summer and then towards December of that year, the coordinator, He had mentioned to me if I was interested in taking the full time position as a coordinator for this leadership program at this nonprofit. And at the same time I had just switched from being a pre med biology student to a psychology student, focusing a lot on community health a lot on youth development, community engaging engagement. And I was like, Oh, this is interesting. I'm like, I told him like, I'm still an undergrad. Like I still have a couple of years left. And he said, yeah, we'll work around your schedule. And, if you work around hours and it worked, I went still stay full time as a college student, started working full time at a nonprofit organization as coordinator for this youth leadership program. I took a lot of classes on Saturdays and some on the evenings. And whichever, if I had to take class in the morning, they would accommodate my schedule so that I would start a little later. But I did work full time and then went to school full time around my junior year of college.

Miguel Sanchez: 10:13

Would you say that experience led you to pick your graduate program? Would you say that experience led you to wanting to help first generation students?

Nelson Rodriguez: 10:25

Definitely not the graduate program. That one I'll explain in a minute, but it did help me to understand working in communities. Working with different folks, providing opportunities. I went from La Casa Don Pedro to another smaller non profit called Club de Barrio, where I was the advisor for the teen center. That was the job that transformed everything for me. In that job, Dr. Bosch, who I don't see as much contact now as I would like to, but she saw a lot of promise in me. She had me learn everything about the non profit. Everything. We were a small staff, I think about 30, 40 people. And I was always eager and willing to listen and to work. She had me helping with the Meals on Wheels, which helped the HIV and AIDS recipients. I worked with the daycare center. I also helped with domestic violence. I also went to board meetings, which I was 20 something years old going to these board meetings. That helped me expand my network. Learn how to grow and work in different communities, but also focus on the work I was doing as the advisor for the teen center, working with the high school students in the area, providing opportunities for them when it came to college applications, when it came to professional development, we took field trips. Like I remember I would take them to Washington DC in a day, but we didn't have a lot of money for the nonprofit, but we had a van. And I remember my first time going to Washington DC and you can do a lot of the stuff in DC for free. You just got to drive there. I was younger. If I could take the four hour drive, walk around all day, take the four hour drive back. And it worked. A lot of the work I do now at Sarah Lawrence College, I learned at that time working at Club del Barrio.

Miguel Sanchez: 11:54

How did you get involved working with first generation students or mentoring first generation students? So

Nelson Rodriguez: 12:00

I've always somehow mentored first generation students. That's just been a thing in different positions that I have, whether it's non profit, I worked in local government, I used to work for the mayor of Newark, Cory Booker, then mayor of Newark, now Senator Booker. And It always, students will always gravitate to each other, first generation students and myself, we always just gravitated to each other, towards each other. It's just, it was, intrinsic thing to do. I didn't go out and say, Hey, I'm going to mentor you to get into college or, Hey, I'm going to mentor you because you're just like me, first gen trying to get everything done. Then I, at one point I applied for a position at my alma mater, Montclair State University for the Upward Bound program, which is a federal First gen assistance program, and that's a program that's all over the United States and in the territories of Guam, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. This program. It's amazing. I saw it was at my alma mater. I applied for the assistant director of the project that opened up a whole avenue to purposefully work in the first gen sphere, not just, provide possible opportunities to mentor students here and there, but this was more purposeful with the work I learned at nonprofits, the work that I learned in city government helped me to network and grow and understand more of the first gen struggles, particularly for that generation, because of the first gen struggles for my generation changed. For those that are now in the current generation of first gen students because there is, I want to say more opportunity, but with more choice, more opportunity becomes more confusion. And with mine, it was a straight to the cut. Montclair State University offered me the pre med program. I didn't even look at my other schools. I was like that, but as I mentioned before, I always try to have high school students now when they're in their senior year, look at your financial aid packages because even though you're filling out the FAFSA, some schools will offer you private grants and private scholarships that they won't offer until you get accepted. So look at the offers before making your choice.

Miguel Sanchez: 13:58

What are some of the toughest challenges you are seeing With students choosing a college, what do you think are some of the toughest challenges they're facing?

Nelson Rodriguez: 14:06

Financial, it's always going to be financial. When I was growing up college was still not as affordable and there wasn't as much financial aid. It's gotten less affordable and there's been less financial aid. There's a larger trend of first generation students going to college. And there was 10, 15 years ago. What I always say, always tell students as soon as the FAFSA opens, the federal application for free student aid, fill it out. It is not an infinite amount of money. It's a finite amount of government decides to give you, depending on how much money your parents make, but also colleges look at the FAFSA to decide whether they should be giving you more or less financial aid from their own institution. It is a trend now to bring in first generation programming. First generation students, because there's more opportunities for generation programming. Again, I will mention my alma mater, Montclair University, a friend of mine now works or did work. She just left to a different institution for a program that specifically recruits and brings in first generation students called Frist to Fly. That's a trend that's going on with a lot of other institutions now where they are particularly looking. And as I talked to parents, particular parents that are immigrants, when they hear, that they have enough to owe money, I always tell them it's an investment. As opposed to thinking that you may have to take out a loan and always has to be federal loans Never take a private loan The loans may seem scary at the time, but it's something you pay over time. It's an investment. It's the first investment. Just like taking AP courses or honors courses, you're investing your time to improve your education. When I was running the Upward Bound program at Montclair State and then became the director at Rutgers University, I would tell parents, look, your child is coming to class on Saturdays. Because with the Upward Bound program, students take extra courses. To strengthen their math, science and writing skills, but they're taking classes on Saturday. That's six days of school and it's mandatory. You have to come to the Saturday programs. And so that's an investment, just like they're investing their time. Taking out loans is an investment for the future, financially for their children and for the kids themselves. But that's always the scariest one when we come to the FAFSA, when we talk about taking out money, the loans always scare the parents, especially first gen parents. And that's, I've tried to dissuade them into being scared of it and seeing it as an investment into the future.

Miguel Sanchez: 16:23

What are some of the challenges first gen students face as they start their careers?

Nelson Rodriguez: 16:29

I've been mentoring some young people or now adults I'm looking to see if the job they're applying for has a 401k is the investment and retirement looking at retirement funds looking to plan financially towards the future. But also picking out the right health care that they need for themselves and their families, if they're going to have families as well. A car, some students want like the fancy brand new car, But there are some cars that maintenance costs more just because of the nature of the car. Just getting them to understand their finances, credit cards. I have a friend called the Budgetnista Tiffany Alish, graduate of Montclair State University. She talks about finance. She does a program called the One Week Budget and helps people budget what they need and what they don't need. She's been, I believe, on Oprah. She talked to the Obamas about it. She's done amazing stuff, and she's from finances and understanding your finances. Do you need the brand new iPhone? Maybe you want to pay your rent first. So you have those things that unfortunately our parents don't always talk to us about like credit cards, taking out loans for a car, maintenance on a car, how many times you have to go in to get, again, I keep staying on this, but it's important that folks understand that you can get the really nice car when you're a little bit more established in your career, no one's going to judge your car. If they are judging a card that different,

Miguel Sanchez: 17:44

that's a great point. And when we were developing the idea of this podcast, we thought about doing one on first gen finances or personal finance. I

Nelson Rodriguez: 17:55

recommend that very much.

Miguel Sanchez: 17:57

How do you think college has transformed your life?

Nelson Rodriguez: 18:01

I enjoyed my time as an undergrad at Montclaire university. I was there for five years and I always tell students it's not that scary. To be there five years, I switched majors and I had to catch up. My last semester there, I only took one course because I just needed two more credits to graduate. I was not paying attention to my credits. When I took the position at Montclair City University for the Upward Bound project, I then decided, you know what, I'm telling these first gen students, the first ones in their families to take a sleep to go into college. I should be doing the same thing with my graduate degree and get my graduate degree. So then I, as an example for the students in my care, I applied for the graduate program, got in and I was able to balance work and school as well as other things that I was doing as volunteering. I was a soccer coach for a couple years in the city of Newark, did some volunteer work with the Community Food Bank of New Jersey with United Way. And still maintaining the networks. Still doing school, still doing my social stuff and really getting involved as a graduate student, which that's another podcast for another day, because I did a whole study about graduate students and how they may or may not be involved in campus life as you would think they would be. We'll talk about that another day. I got lucky and really college helped me to understand the balance. Of having your social life, educational life, professional life. For me, I just melded all those things together and had a life. I spent my time in the library, but also spent time at a bar with friends for happy hour. I volunteered in my community. Volunteering, coaching soccer and was able to find the balance and all of that, as well as, still see my friends and family, visit my parents. I see my parents at least once a week, but finding that balance in college really helped me find that balance as an undergrad and as a grad student,

Miguel Sanchez: 19:45

what do you wish you had known? When you were a first generation student during your first year in college.

Nelson Rodriguez: 19:52

Like I said, ask for help. That is the biggest thing. More and more colleges are investing in advisement. More and more colleges are also accepting students that are non declared majors. Which when I was applying for college, my guidance counselor in high school told me you have to apply as a major, you can't go undeclared. But now that's not the same. Now schools do look at that. They look at your extracurriculars. They look at your essay. They look at things that you're doing in your community. They're looking if you have a part time job. I worked at McDonald's on my college application. The admissions officer would have looked at that and said, Oh he's, working. He's spending his time doing something outside of just, part time. And but really, I, if I would have asked for help, I would have graduated on time. I would have been able to possibly maybe even think about graduate school as I was an undergrad, because I didn't think about it until I went back to work at this college to get my graduate degree. And Really, look for advisors, look for mentors. I always tell students that there are three levels of mentoring. You have your advisor that's there just for your college and your academics. You find a mentor that also cares about academics, but also cares about your personal life. And then you find a champion and your champion is the CEO of a company or the president or the vice president that knows just about enough of you to write a recommendation letter, but you're not going to invite them to your wedding. You're not going to tell them about your breakup. You're just going to share the good stuff, but you need that person, you need that champion when you're applying for jobs or you're applying for opportunities. But then the mentor and the advisor, those are the people you tell everything to. But find those three. When you get to college, find those three for yourself. I had my champion was Dr. Tolman in my graduate program. That has, doesn't really know anything about my personal life. But when I get a new job, or I'm applying for a new position, I send him a quick email. Hey, Dr. Tolman, can I use you as a recommendation letter? And he works as a, he's the director of the PhD program down in Georgia Southern University. And he still remembers me as a student and writes amazing recommendation letters.

Miguel Sanchez: 21:47

Nelson, I don't think we can end the podcast any other way. That advice of finding mentors, even. specific mentors was very inspiring and I need to go out there and find my champion. Nelson, thank you for speaking with me today. I appreciate your time and I know this conversation will continue. We should have you in the future once again. Thank you. Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the episode. Subscribe to this podcast and share it with a friend. Don't forget to leave a review. Until next time.