Texas by Jesus

Texas by Jesus - July 2016 Scholarship Essay

Back when I was barely initiating my college career, I was not able to test out of developmental algebra and was forced into taking elementary and intermediate algebra prior to taking college algebra. I was going through many family problems at the time and was not very focused on school at all. I went through the motions of passing my classes and did not learn much in the process. When I finally took college algebra, I dropped the course because I was not able to keep up with everything that was going on in my life and learn from that course simultaneously, and it did not help that my professor was un-motivating as well. I finished up that semester and planned on retaking it again the following semester in spring of 2014.
Determined to pass the course because the previous semester was an embarrassment, I went to the first day of college algebra with my new teacher who was named Mr. Gilbert Perez. Mr. Perez was a very kind, goofy and outgoing instructor. He was much more charismatic and motivating than my instructor from the previous semester. I ended up loving the course, much more than I expected and looked forward to doing the homework that he would assign and taking the daily quizzes that he would give prior to lecturing. I found this to be very odd since I was a liberal arts major at the time. As the semester went on, I came to love math more and more. In grade school, middle school and part of high school I loved math but began to despise it senior year due to other family problems that I had since I had so much on my mind and was not able to excel in the course as much as I wanted to. Mr. Perez reignited that fire within me for the love of math that I once had and forgotten.
He was the one that helped me decide that I wanted to pursue a career in some sort of STEM field subject. The only problem was that I was in MAT1313 and I needed MAT1413 to progress onto precalculus (MAT 2411). One day I went to the math department chair, Dr. Fariabi, seeking assistance and asking if he would allow me to take precalculus. He noticed my A in the class and told me that he would give me the override if Mr. Perez wrote a letter allowing me to move on. The following day I stayed after class and talked to Mr. Perez about my plans. He said that he would happily write the letter as long as I promised to go over a couple of chapters not taught in the 1313 version of the course. Everything fell into place and I was able to take precalculus during the summer semester with another great teacher.
Today I am a Junior biomedical engineering major at UTSA. It is hard to believe that today, I am passed calculus 1, 2 and 3, linear algebra and differential equations. It is also astonishing that I am going to take a research course next semester at UTSA over impulsive differential equations, that I am one course away from getting a minor in math and that I am a current math tutor for varsity tutors! I was not expecting one course, one semester, one instructor to have such an impact on my college career or my life, but it happened. This goes to show that some of the best events can happen spontaneously, when you least expect it and some of the most unexpected people can help you get through unfortunate events occurring in your life. I am thankful to have met Mr. Perez because he was a huge part of the equation on the path where I and and where I am going (see the pun I made? Ha!). God bless him, I cannot thank him enough.