Six years ago my parents divorced after twenty years of marriage. The same year the Eagle women?s soccer team won its first Valley Championship and I succeeded in graduating from a school I attended since kindergarten.

My high school experience stood out more to me than getting a good education. Fresno Christian was a place I called home, because the walls of the high school were the only place I felt the love of a genuine family.

This school prepared me for my education endeavors and saved me from falling into a life of complete bitter isolation. The adventures and successes I have today would not be possible had I not attended Fresno Christian High School.

After graduating in 2001, I instantly jumped into sitting in undergraduate classes and playing on the women?s soccer team at Fresno Pacific University. Looking back so much has changed in my life. After I graduated from Fresno Pacific with a bachelor?s degree in English and an emphasis in secondary education (2005), I knew that it was time to leave Fresno’s bird?s nest.

That same summer I received the opportunity to move to western Massachusetts and work as an AmeriCorps member. When the summer ended, I hopped in my Kia Sephia and drove 3,000 miles away from my hometown.

When I arrived in Massachusetts, I quickly immersed myself into the nonprofit organization of AmeriCorps. For the next 10 months, I worked with adolescents in a residential program from the ages of 16-21. The residents in the program were either kicked out of their parent?s home or they were moved out of foster care. Working in Massachusetts opened my eyes to how much I enjoyed working with adolescents. When my 10-month term ended, I decided to move to New York City to obtain a Masters degree.

A year has now passed since I moved here to New York City. Currently, I am enrolled in Long Island University in Brooklyn, working toward my Masters in Urban Education. I am one year away from completion and, when I am done, I plan to stay in the city and teach.

The city has so much to offer and I find myself taking in and enjoying my life here. The last time I went to Fresno, I longed to be back in my new home of New York City. After my sister and brother-in-law visited me this summer, they understood as to why I call this my new home.

The city life is now in my veins and I just enjoy each day that I have here. Many of my friends and family members that still reside in Fresno tell me that they never thought I would be the one to leave. Especially after I graduated from the small high school of Fresno Christian.

Looking back to my high school days, I feel at times that I am living in a dream. I know my life would not have turned out the way it has if I went to a different high school. Attending FCHS gave me a small classroom structure and quality teachers to help me succeed in my constant academic struggles, due to an undiagnosed learning disability.

The teachers in the school reached out more than just their hands, but their hearts to me when my parents divorced. Though I am living in one of the largest cities in the world, jamming myself in a packed subway car to get to work in the morning, I see more faces than I can count in one day. I always cherish the small and family like atmosphere that I had at FCHS.

My high school days were more than just memories, they were life-changing moments that saved me to live and experience an incredible future.