Silvia Popoca Blog

My Mentors
June 1, 2020

College, while extremely rewarding, has certainly not been easy. Each year, I’ve gotten more involved in school academically and socially, and while I’ve loved nearly all of my experiences during my time in college, I find myself getting more exhausted each year. This past year, on top of taking a full load of classes for my philosophy major and French minor, I took a leadership role in my job with Jumpstart, a program that helps prepare underrepresented preschoolers for kindergarten. I love my job, but it requires much more work than I initially expected. Soon, I found myself spread thin, working minimum 20 hours a week on top of a full load of classes and participating in clubs.   

While my family is always supportive of me, they cannot grasp what I am going through. I am the first in my family to ever go to college, and often, they don’t understand how I could be stressed doing something they consider so simple. Because of this, at times, I don’t feel comfortable sharing my stress with them. This is why I am so grateful to have my mentors. Every time I speak to them, they make sure to not invalidate my feelings when I vent about my struggles. They are always supportive and helpful listeners. If I tell them I am stressed or struggling in school, they remind me that I am not alone and try to help me create a plan to navigate the situation. Furthermore, I truly appreciate how concerned they are with my well-being. They are of course invested in my academic success, but they’ve helped me ensure that school does not interfere with my health. Last semester, they gave me some advice that has helped me survive the academic year, especially since classes became online. They told me to remind myself each week of things I’m proud I’ve done. I am constantly hard on myself, so this was a daunting task. Since classes moved online, it became increasingly harder to motivate myself to do academic work. On top of this, since I am now home, I try to help around the house as much as I can. As I found myself becoming more stressed and less motivated, I remembered my mentors’ advice. At the end of each week, I wrote two things I was proud I did that week and two things I wanted to improve. I cannot say that my struggles completely went away, but my mentors’ advice helped me pull myself together and finish the semester.   

As said previously, I am extremely appreciative of my mentors. They are accommodating with me, understanding of my struggles, and supportive of my goals. I could not have made it this far in my college career without them, and I always look forward to next meetings.  

Perfection is Unattainable
July 2, 2019

The best type of advice my mentor has given me is to let go of my worries and to be okay with making mistakes. I am a perfectionist. I have always been. So, when I make a small mistake, it feels like a failure to me. In high school, I would complain when I got a 95% on a test because I thought I should’ve studied harder to get a perfect score. At the time, this drive toward perfection motivated me to do my best. I told myself this was the reason I graduated at the top of my class and got into a great university. 

When I got to college, I continued to be just as hard on myself and soon enough, I felt that I could not keep up to my own standards. In high school, I always felt like I could keep up with the work and so well, but it was the opposite in college. In college, I felt like I was surrounded around people way smarter than me, and I always felt out of place. I still told myself I had to get the best grades because if I didn’t I wouldn’t get into the best law school possible, and I would disappoint my family. So, I spent every second studying. This did help me improve my grades, but I felt unhappy. I was only focused on getting the best grades instead of enjoying everything I was learning. 

I continued this way until last semester when I talked to my mentors. When I talked to them, I told them how much I was struggling they reminded me that perfection was unattainable. My mentors, Megan and Beth told me they were not perfect students when they were in college either. Yet, they reminded me, that they went on to go to law school and become lawyers. My mentor Abe told me that in college, he struggled with his GPA but he too managed to go Law School and is about to graduate. After confiding about my struggles with them, I realized that work ethic is important to succeed. That’s what made me a great student in high school and still makes me one in college. Trying to get perfect grades only stresses me out even more and it impairs my learning. Now I try to focus on learning the most, I find that I enjoy my classes a lot more, and as a result I feel like and equal with my peers. Even when I do not always get the grades I want, I am proud of the work I put into the class. It hasn’t been easy; I often have to remind myself that it is okay to struggle and that I don’t have to be perfect. Every time I feel like I am struggling again, I talked to my mentors, and they remind me once again, that I don’t have to be perfect to succeed.

“Sí, Se Puede” is a phrase born of farmworkers, who, under the leadership of the UFW, César Chávez, and Dolores Huerta, fought valiantly for equal protection under the law. As a result of the efforts of the UFW, “Sí, Se Puede” has become well known as a call that engenders hope and inspiration in those who face similar battles. We thank the UFW, whom we acknowledge to be the sole and exclusive owner of the Trademark SI SE PUEDE, for granting us a limited license to use“Sí, Se Puede” in connection with our efforts to recruit, in Colorado, students of Hispanic or Latino descent for our law school pipeline program. For more information about the programs offered by the UFW, please see UFW’s webpage (www.ufw.org); UFW Foundation’s webpage (www.ufwfoundation.org); and UFWF’s immigration services webpage (www.sisepuede.org)