Local honor student earns scholarship to UA law school

Mercedes Garcia recalls her mother always emphasizing education. From her earliest years, she remembers hearing, “You can’t be anything without an education.”

An only child raised by a single parent, Garcia spoke lovingly of her mother and the excellent education she received at Continental School. Although Spanish was her first language, she learned English in pre-school and is easily bilingual. Of her pre-school memories, she said, “I grew up learning to read with the Berenstain Bears and Amelia Bedelia.”

Years after moving on, she still has fond memories of Continental and says, “Continental was an amazing school; I was so prepared for high school. Continental provided me with the tools for high school… when I got to Sahuarita High I was more advanced than kids from other schools.”

Reading, writing and art always came easy, Garcia said, science was OK and math took more work.

A student at heart, in addition to receiving several local scholarships when she was accepted to the University of Arizona she was awarded a Gates Millennium Scholarship that was initially funded by a $1 billion grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The goal of Gates Millennium Scholarship is to promote academic excellence for minority students with significant financial need so they can reach their highest potential.

Graduating from the University of Arizona in May 2007 with a Bachelors degree in journalism and sociology and minors in Spanish and anthropology for the past year she’s been a Community Outreach and Marketing Associate at United Community Health Center.

But ever since her sophomore year in college she knew that she wanted to study law. With a heritage that’s three-fourths Mexican and one fourth Yaqui Indian, Garcia has dreamed of specializing in immigration law and indigenous peoples law.

The opportunity to realize that dream starts Aug. 25 at the University of Arizona Law School because just recently she learned that she’s been awarded a full Merit Scholarship for Law for three years.

Friday is Garcia’s last day at United Community Health Center as she heads to New Mexico to take summer law classes on torts, property and one that she says is still unannounced.

Asked her mother’s reaction to her three-year Merit Scholarship for Law Garcia became very tearful and said, “She still hasn’t come down from the clouds. She is so proud… she raised me by herself.”