Summary: Jose Arevalo was five when his parents brought him and his nine siblings from Mexico to the United States for migrant farm jobs. He enrolled in school, but without knowing English, and without support from his school, he failed the first grade. Luckily, a bilingual teacher helped him bridge the gap. After school, Jose decided to join one of his brothers in South Bend. Jose became a leader in the Upward Bound program working with first generation college students to afford and acclimate to college. In 2009, Indiana University South Bend Professor Dr. Hayley Froysland worked with the Civil Rights Heritage Center to preserve stories from South Bend’s Latinx community. Jose was kind enough to share his.
