Evelyn Ruiz

My name is Evelyn A. Ruiz Trujillo. I was born in Jalostotitlan Jalisco, Mexico and migrated to the U.S. in 1996 at the age of six. I have an older sister and younger brother, and I am a mother of a 5-year old boy and a wife. I come from a mixed-status family -my brother and I are the only DACA recipients the rest are U.S. residents or U.S. citizens. My husband and I are both DACA recipients. I was diagnosed with ADHD and depression in 2018. I am also a first generation student who transferred from San Bernardino Valley College in 2017 with an A.A. in Psychology and minor in Sociology, and I am currently a major is Sociology.
I am a first-generation student with a multi-dimensional identity. For me, it means being a mother, DACAmented, and an advocate for myself and family. As a result of this, I sometimes feel lost with class material because of our tight schedules and the need to determine how our time will be used throughout the day.
My employment and volunteer work while at the community college focused on how to maximize national and local resources for DREAMers. This inspired my role as President and Co-founder of the DREAMers club at my community college campus. Addressing the DACA opportunities gave hope to many of the students and of course the chance to be employed.
Now as I continue my journey to graduating UCR in 2020, I continue to serve as an advocate for my community. I am currently the VP- for the R’kids Organization, which focuses in providing support for students, faculty, and staff who have children, expecting children, or will have children. As an employee of the Women’s Resource Center, a center that provides support to women of different backgrounds such as myself, I have had the opportunity to grow and feel supported by my colleagues, as well as by other student parents.
As a student parent, it is my duty to advocate for myself and other parenting students alike.  I have faced setbacks such as lack of funding for childcare, books, and having to transition into higher education as a first-generation transfer college student. Our goal is to create a student parent center one-stop shop so that students with dependents feel supported and welcomed, where we receive emotional and social support from other student parents who are having the same challenges of being a parent. We would like to have trained staff that can help navigate higher education as a parenting student.
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