UP Deserves Your Support

Because I just went to the Unlimited Potential graduation party, and I saw that the programs are effective and have changed lives. Ask Maria Angeles (below).

I don’t ever want to miss Unlimited Potential’s End-of-the-Year Celebration. Why? I have never seen any happier people than at that party. The sweet taste of learning success produces grand smiles on these graduates’ faces. More than sixty women and men, and about 20 preschool children, rejoiced in their education awards.

Brooks’ School’s multipurpose room teemed with festively dressed graduates and their families. They were not the typical students—poverty-level moms, day-laborer fathers, or low-income Latinos from many walks—but they stuck through one year of English and Life Skills instructions.

For the happy occasion, the women had chosen to color-coordinate their outfits: The first-year students dressed in teal tops and black bottoms, the second-year class in blue tops, and the evening students in all-black. The littlest of the Unlimited Potential program wore costumes in yellow, like little chicks just hatched. Performing their songs, rhymes, and dances, they stole everybody’s heart.

This celebration was a concerted effort. Participants had put their planning and cooking skills together and provided all of the catering themselves. Enchiladas, posole, rice, you name it, this party stimulated the senses with tasty aromas.

Sandra Amarillas, the first-year teacher, shared: Daytime classes had excellent attendance, but evening course students struggled after a hard day’s work. Struggles are surrounding many of these participants: making ends meet, at a loss about children’s school progress, rejection on the job quest, medical challenges, and many other obstacles. Yet Unlimited Potential’s equal opportunity education, support, and resources were an invaluable experience to them. As in previous years, participants were seriously committed and eager to learn.

What does Unlimited Potential do, what does it mean? Education is a basic human right, but too many individuals are excluded from this privilege. So UP’s program reaches out to a segment of the working-poor, predominantly Latino population in Phoenix to provide them access to knowledge and life skills.

It takes a whole village to raise a child. Yes, but it also takes parents with a keen awareness about how to guide their children to build a better future for themselves and all of us. Education makes individuals more productive and societies better.

“Thank you, thank you, for helping my mom!” a man spontaneously addressed me. He came up to me because he noticed that I was taking my volunteer photographer pictures. It felt good to be thanked, but I said, “Not me, thank these teachers here. They made it all happen.”

The man dressed in a guyabera shirt was Ivan Valdez. “My mom learned English so well and many other things. She was able to get a job. She is now working in manufacturing.” Maria Angeles felt very accomplished about her change in life.

And that made me feel good as well.