Chemeketa Voices

One Chance:
Eduardo Martinez

Every once in a while a student shows up to one of Eduardo Martinez’s classes ready to call it quits.

“Just before class begins, they’ll come to my office and tell me they’re there to turn in their books,” said Martinez, an instructor in Chemeketa Community College’s High School Equivalency program.

Some of these students won’t be convinced to return to their seats and give it another try, but, if they do, Martinez will pull them aside after class and share his story.

It goes something like this:

Martinez was born in a Guatemalan village of about 5,000 people. At age nine, he was sent to a city boarding school on an education scholarship secured for him by a village priest. A few years later, a civil war that had raged and ebbed for more than four decades took a turn for the worse. The reigning government began killing indigenous people, and Martinez took it upon himself to flee the country. He was 12.

“It was every man for himself. Save your soul,” said Martinez.”Bullets were flying everywhere, so I just ran as fast as I could.”

He spent the next two years living and working in Mexico. He considered staying, but cultural realities kept him from settling permanently.

“It’s very easy to spot the differences between native Mexicans and those from further south. I was afraid I would get caught, be deported to Guatemala, and then I would be dead,” said Martinez.

Saving money little by little, then moving farther north, Martinez set his sights on crossing the U.S. border. He ended up in San Diego, an undocumented worker. Work, however, was scarce and Martinez’s difficulties in finding it were redoubled because of his short stature – most potential employers thought he was much younger than his true age. He ate whatever he could pick from the fields where he hoped to find employment and often slept in the fields, too.

A few days after landing his first paying job, officers in the Immigration and Naturalization Service caught up with Martinez and he was deported to Mexico. By then, he’d learned the ins and outs of being an undocumented immigrant and was back on American soil the next day. He picked up his check from the farm where he had been working and rode a cargo train to L.A.

Work in the city of angels was a wash cloth, a squirt bottle and hope for a quarter in exchange for a clean windshield at a local gas station. Martinez hadn’t showered in days when he cleaned the windshield of a woman who offered to put him in touch with her son-in-law, a Coyote, who offered passage to Washington. For a price.

“He didn’t think anyone would hire me in Washington either, but he agreed to take me on the condition that I would pay him for the trip even if I couldn’t find work,” Martinez said.

He found a job at an apple orchard. The orchard owner ponied up the $350 cost of the trip to Washington and the amount was deducted from his checks in $40 increments. He spent the next three years of his early 20’s following the harvest seasons between Washington and California, but life was far from good.

“I prayed every night for God to take me, or find me a home, or that someone would adopt me,” he said. “I just couldn’t handle it.”

He began making regular trips to a bridge spanning the Columbia River. At the bridge, he thought long and hard about a decision that would make all his struggles vanish in a heartbeat. But, each time, he found the strength to believe in a better tomorrow. 

Shortly after completing his third year of the harvest cycle, Martinez was deported a second time. He was left with $40 and used it to finance his trip back to L.A. He was living under the freeway and lining up for free meals in a park when one of the missionaries there took pity on him.

“I was always on time and I guess that caused them to notice me,” said Martinez. “I told them the story about my family and it must have touched their hearts.”

They offered him a small room and free meals in exchange for cleaning up the mission’s facilities and returning to school. Martinez completed 11th and 12th grade while living at the mission and graduated at the top of his class with scholarships. He felt his prayers had been answered.

He started out at Marymount College, completing general education requirements, but had to complete a practicum in which he had to prove his legal status. Because he had no legal documents for residency in the U.S., he chose to leave the program. He then decided to study education and completed a liberal arts bachelor’s degree at Loyola Marymount University.  During his last year of studies at Loyola Marymount, the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 made Martinez a U.S. citizen. 

A few years later, in 1992, Martinez was interested in studying for a master’s in linguistics.  He met up with a friend working toward a doctorate in linguistics at the University of Oregon and considered applying to the U of O. 

“It appealed to me because I was interested in capturing the languages and stories that had been passed down through my family, so I came up and interviewed for the program,” he said.

University officials offered him a full ride if he performed well enough in a few of the basic linguistics courses and found him a math and sciences teaching position in the Ducks’ High School Equivalency Program. The job ended up being much more than part time, but Martinez understood the importance of his work based on his own experiences.

When the director of Chemeketa’s High School Equivalency Program offered him a position as a temporary replacement for another instructor, Martinez accepted. When the position opened up permanently, he was quickly hired.  He thought it would help him get back to working on his master’s, and three years on he’s still working toward that goal.

Martinez found something like a new family at Chemeketa.  It made the college a good fit because his father is the reason Martinez stuck with his own education.

“I was one of 16 children and we were just poor. We didn’t have enough food each day; it had to be rationed all the time. My father told us that the only way to get out of that poverty – the only way to have a better life than what he provided – was by going to school. No matter what,” said Martinez.

He thinks back to those words every time one of his students wants to turn in their books. It would be easy to let those students walk out the door, but precious little in life has come easy for Martinez and he’s not the type to start now.

Martinez’s story is not simply his story, it’s the story of many who come to this country seeking something better and the struggles they encounter to attain it. It’s a testament to what can be done with one opportunity, one chance, and the desire to make it into something more.

“Education is the only way to get out of the fields and make sure that their kids don’t have to go through the same things. If I can make it, they can pull through, and we’ll find ways to make that easier. But you have to start as soon as possible,” he said.

By Eric A. Howald. Have a great Chemeketa story? Send us an e-mail.

Updated September 26, 2008 by Marketing and Student Recruitment.