Photo by Gabriella Castillo

     “I was born in Miami, Florida, but I moved down here when I was three [or] four years old,” Alarcón Lawrence said. “My parents are from Cuba; both of them were born there.”
     Alarcón Lawrence stays closely connected with her family’s roots in everything she does. Her family were the best example she had for finding a sense of place. When entering high school, she was doubtful of her ability to find community and ultimately thrive within the school.
     “I actually didn’t know how I was going to get through it, because I had just come out of a whole different school,” Alarcón Lawrence said. “It was just different, and I didn’t know if I was going to make it all the way through.”
     Being talkative and outgoing benefited her in social aspects. Alarcón Lawrence overcame these doubts about high school; she could not have done it without the support of friends and family.
     “I adjusted quite well and got a really good group of friends that helped me a lot,” Alarcón Lawrence said.  “Being myself and being able to communicate well with other people, like peers and teachers, really helped.”
     Alarcón Lawrence’s pathway to Rose is unlike any other. Her family had moved numerous times before finally settling down in Greenville.
     “[My parents] came separately, [my mom] came when she was twenty-one, and [my dad] came a year after that,” Alarcón Lawrence said. “They went down to Florida and then [together] moved to Chicago before moving here to North Carolina.”
     She is the oldest out of three sisters, making her the first to attend school in the United States. The Cuban school system itself is set up in a similar style to the United States with students studying the same number of years, but the distribution of years and types of schools is different.
     “They don’t have high school in Cuba, it’s a three-year program like pre-college,” Alarcón Lawrence said. “Primaria is kindergarten to 9th grade, [and] then middle school or pre-college is from 10th grade to 12th grade.”
      Alarcón Lawrence has not let being a first-generation high school student hold her back. When seeking guidance for her future, she has a lot of options to choose from.
     “I talk to my Grandma because she is part of the admissions process at [East Carolina University] and she is a professor there, so she knows a lot of the stuff that goes on,” Alarcón Lawrence said. “[My mom] went to a college in Florida, completed her professional volleyball [career], then she moved here and went to college at ECU.”
     When Alarcón Lawrence thinks about how important her future is, she is reminded of how grateful she is to be in the United States. She believes the education system in Cuba is of a different quality than that in the United States.
      “I think that it’s a privilege to be able to experience the U.S. school system because I know back in Cuba, it’s very different,” Alarcón Lawrence said. “I’m just glad that I got to experience it and that my sisters will also be able to experience and thrive through it.”
      While Alarcón Lawrence had a different schooling experience than her parents had in Cuba, she has not let her heritage escape her thought process. Her parents are key to her success and are her true motivators.
      “They’re always telling me I have to be better than them; I feel that’s how all parents are, [and] they want you to be better than them,” Alarcón Lawrence said. “Especially because [my parents] didn’t get the same opportunities that I [have] since I grew up in the U.S. and they didn’t.”