Some shatter in the face of adversity. Some quit when faced with struggle. Not them. For them, things often looked hopeless, but they fought on. They realized that life isn’t about the difficulties, but about how you face them. They kept hope. For them, tomorrow never dies...

THE AGENT

001 Joey's Story    

002 Jessica's Story    

003 Holly's Story    

004 John's Story    

005 Greg's Story

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Jarvis first in large family to graduate

By Megan Verkerk

FIELD OF DREAMS: Joey Jarvis’s love for baseball shows as he coaches a little league team in his spare time. Photo by Jenny Bui

His oldest brother is 24 years old. His youngest brother is less than a year old.

So far he is the only person out of his older brothers to be on track to graduate.

With 10 brothers, life hasn’t always been easy for Joey Jarvis. Back when all his brothers where living at home, going to the grocery store was an expensive trip. They would spend $300 to $400 on food for the week. They still spend the same amount but three weeks later, they still have half the food.

He now lives with five brothers. The oldest two live in Arizona, the next oldest three moved out and got married.

Being the oldest living at home has its pluses and minuses. A plus is that he is graduating high school and will receive his diploma. A minus, he is just the second of his family to make it to his senior year.

Jarvis started to turn around his schooling sophomore. He decided he wanted to finish high school knowing that none of his brothers have finished high school. He has been going to night school and taking extra classes.

Besides for going to school, Jarvis helps coach a Western Little League Minor B Baseball team.

Jarvis is only down 45 credits after this semester. So over the summer, Jarvis may take a class or two at Delta, and graduate at the end of the first semester next year.

“I want to get my diploma,” he said. “Just so I can take it home and rub it in my brother’s face.”

When his mom found out that he wanted to go to college, “she was really excited,” he said.

Her first four children dropped out for various reasons. One got a bad case of senioritis; another had his first child sophomore year.

“She was mad,” Jarvis said. “But it’s their decision.”

Jarvis’ mom started to think of all the ways to help her son out with tuition. Ideas like fixing up and selling their condominium. The money they get from that would go towards his tuition.

Jarvis’ dad expects him to graduate. His dad knew he can go places with his sports.

Another person who has really helped him through high school is his coach Don Norton.

“Coach Norton opened my eyes to colleges,” Jarvis said.

Besides Norton, other baseball coaches like John Stevenson and Quincy Noble helped show Jarvis his true potential.

“He can be a great athlete,” Norton said. “He’s got a lot of potential.”

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Ortiz finds success

MESA leads student new path

By Jenny Bui

LAUNCHING HER FUTURE: Jessica Ortiz’s MESA involvement helped her overcome past struggles and have a positive attitude. Photo by Kelsey Hayahsi

A teenage girl is pregnant at 16, absorbed in the world of drugs and alcohol, oblivious to the importance of education. It is the image of failure. This was supposed to be her fate – the fate of her own mother.

Jessica Ortiz had nightmares that she was kidnapped and molested by a father figure. When she confronted her mother about her nightmares, Ortiz found out that they weren’t just bad dreams. They were reality. It was the reality of her life before she turned 3 and was adopted by her grandmother.

The physical resemblance between Ortiz and her mother was a reminder for everyone, a reminder that Ortiz might go down the same road. No one thought she would graduate high school, she said, let alone get accepted into four-year university.

You are just like your mother. These harsh words always shatter Ortiz’s heart. On several occasions these words have caused her to leave her grandmother’s house and run to her mother for comfort. But there was never comfort, she said. Only a drunk mother who didn’t care.

As an aftermath of the disturbing events of her past, Ortiz’s confidence was degraded.

“I was kind of slow when I was little,” she said.

She carried this low self-esteem with her into high school. This attitude caught Andrew Walter’s attention. Walter remembers her as the girl in back of his Algebra 3-4 class who tried to blend in with the rest of her peers.

“There are some people you can tell who can do more than they’re letting themselves,” Walter said.

It took a lot of convincing, but Walter finally got Ortiz to joined Mathematical Engineering and Science Achievement Club, which he advises, during the middle of her junior year.

This would be the turning point in her life. When she stepped into MESA she stepped away from what seemed to be her predetermined path of failure.

She signed up for honors class and hung out with college-bound students. She enrolled in a rigorous John Hopkins pre-engineering program, gaining college credit for the class she took. And as she built trbuchet and mousetrap cars in MESA, she was also learning how to build her confidence and her relationships. Walter believed that MESA helped her gain one thing she had lacked before — a supportive family.

“That’s what she found through MESA, a group of supportive people,” Walter said.

The support Ortiz gained from MESA went beyond the classroom. During the last two years, she has gained another supporter and friend. Ortiz has openly shared the struggles of her past with Maria Garcia-Sheets, MESA center director at the University of the Pacific.

“Her background allows her to understand hardship,” Garcia-Sheets said. “It allows her to be passionate and it gives her a perspective that many students don’t have at this time.”

Garcia-Sheets has met many students in the 11 years she has been working for the program but she saw something special in Ortiz. The two built up their relationship through their interaction at various MESA events.

With all expenses paid for her, Ortiz plans to attend UOP this fall, where she will major in biological engineering. As she lays out her path into her future, Ortiz has one goal – to not fail.

This teenage girl has been accepted into every university she applied to and is confident of her future, determined to get the best education she can. It is the image of success.

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Hamilton dreams of sleep

By Sarah Gloria

SLEEPLESS NIGHTS: Holly Hamilton is planning to become a pediatrician after college and will not let her sleeping disorder stop her. Despite her lack of sleep and long commutes to and from school, she still tries to focus on her work. Photo by Ted Nishimura

Holly Hamilton doesn’t get the privilege to just sit back and relax after a long day. Her mind is constantly full of thoughts regarding the next day or something else she could be doing. The thoughts and tasks buzzing through her mind are like a constant alarm clock preventing her from falling asleep.



Teens need about nine and a quarter hours of sleep, according to the Sleep Foundation Web site. Hamilton doesn’t get the necessary amount of sleep but she still manages to function from day to day.

Hamilton sleeps as much as she can in increments of 15 to 30 minutes each night before waking herself up and reminding herself of what else she could be doing. Taking naps during the night helps her get enough energy to get through the next day.

A study involving more than 1,000 teens from ages 13-16 showed that almost one of six had the clinical definition of insomnia.

As one would expect, living a teenage life with insomnia is not easy — especially as a senior.

Hamilton’s case of insomnia is due to her stress and anxiety and she says this has been “by far the worst year.”

While many students have trouble getting work done, Hamilton doesn’t sleep the normal amount of time other students do, so she has more time to complete her work.

To many this may seem like an advantage, but for Hamilton, it is the opposite.

“I’m tired so it slows me down in my thinking process,” Hamilton said. Just because she is awake, she says, she doesn’t exactly feel that way when it’s so late and she’s running on less than an hour of sleep at a time.

“I have to constantly go back ands re-read what I am doing and I have a really short attention span,” she said.

Hamilton has picked up methods of working around the way she feels at different times of the day so she can be prepared for school. Procrastination actually helps her because she can’t retain information for a long time.

“Other kids study before they go to bed, but I don’t sleep much,” she said.

Even though Web MD notes that insomnia usually begins at about age 11, Hamilton noticed her condition much younger. The sleepless mindset has stuck with her since she was 4 or 5, and it turned into anxiety.

She used to be a curious child who wanted to be included in everything, but the causes for her insomnia have changed over the years.

“Now it’s more or less I want to sleep but I can’t,” Hamilton said. “The more I think about it, the more I can’t sleep.”

She hardly sleeps throughout the night, and often goes without sleep at all.

“The longest I went without sleep was four days,” she said.

“Some days I feel like a zombie,” Hamilton said.

Her laid-back personality is apparent and she says she is much calmer than other teens because it makes it easier for her to deal with stress, and can, hopefully, help her get more sleep.

It is hard to believe that a teenager could survive high school with insomnia, but Hamilton isn’t going to be stopped there. She plans to go to Modesto Junior College, transfer to University at California Berkeley and finishing her education at the University of California, San Francisco for medical school.

Despite all she has gone through in dealing with getting schoolwork done and going day to day with very little sleep, she is ready to face a challenging future.

“Medical school is going to be 10 times worse,” she said. “But I love children and I want to be a pediatrician.”

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Game inspires life ambitions

By Chris Quibol

A SCREEN OF FULL ENCOURAGEMENT: Johnathan Bonk spends most nights at home bonding with his parents by playing computer games, a hobby passed down to him by his dad. Photo by Chris Quibol

Imagine living your entire life and suddenly having to redefine yourself. Imagine living a life where your name isn’t actually your name. For Johnathan Bonk, this was exactly the case.

For 18 years his name was Jonathon Thomas, but just recently, he legally became Johnathan Bonk, Bonk shortened from “Bonkowski,” a name of Lithuanian descent.

His childhood is just as confusing as his name.

He lived in a duplex with just his mom on a small street in Hayward, California, after his mom, Linda Bonk Jackson, left his biological father before Bonk was even born. Coincidentally, the man that Bonk would eventually call his dad, David Jackson, lived right underneath him in the bottom half of the two-story duplex.

Today, you could look at Bonk’s family and not one thought of a complex past would come to mind. Today, you would see a family that is more closely knit than any you’ve seen before.

So, how did a skinny kid living in the Bay Area, with a name that wasn’t his and a father he never knew, create this tightly knit family?

“We bought a Super NES and (the family) played Super Mario World 2,” Bonk said with a smirk.

Yes, a video game, and it has been that passion for gaming that has brought his family together. And it was definitely this love for video games that created a friendship between Bonk and his dad, the man who lived underneath them in the duplex in Hayward.

“He was interesting, he was cool,” Bonk said. “(Now) we play games together, do teamwork.”

The two now sit side by side on many nights playing at their custom-made computers, yelling out tactics, commands, and congratulations as they take on competitors online. And it isn’t long before Bonk’s mom sits down and joins them.

“(My dad) can beat me and my mom when we’re playing together,” Bonk said.

For those not used to seeing a family spending a night together bonding, it can be a strange sight.

Bonk has never met his biological father and doesn’t care if he ever does. Yet, even if Jackson isn’t his biological father, the two couldn’t be any closer.

Though family life has been smooth sailing, Bonk hasn’t had the easiest time with school. He failed a semester of geometry, and as a sophomore, he failed world history and a semester of biology.

“It’s like getting slapped in the face when you fail,” Bonk said.

After taking summer school to ensure he completed his credits, Bonk was still 10 credits short of graduation at the beginning of senior year. He’s currently taking a class at Delta College to ensure graduation, but he got his motivation from another area.

“I wanted to graduate with my class, with my (friends),” Bonk said. “I didn’t want to let them down.”

And what keeps Bonk and his friends so close?

Again, it’s video games, and it’s this camaraderie and friendship that the games seem to evoke that has gotten Bonk through crucial moments in his life, giving him the inspiration to give that same experience to others like him.

“And then I got the idea: ‘Why don’t I just make a new game?’ And it took off from their.” Bonk said.

After graduation, he plans on attending Cogswell Polytechnical College in Sunnyvale to become a game developer.

And why not?

After all, video games are what helped a skinny, unassuming, half-Puerto Rican, half-Caucasian kid from Hayward bond with a new father, meet his friends, and decide on a career.

Sometimes stepping into a virtual reality can help people deal with their own reality.

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'Wrestling is my anti-drug'

Haworth works to turn around his life

By Cam Pham

SECURING THE WIN: Greg Haworth, the wrestling team’s co-captain, competed in the 145 lbs. weight category. Despite numerous family struggles, he found his confidence and sanctuary on the mat. Photo by Lisette Saldana

Life in Riverside, California, was good. The sun shined almost everyday of the week with little raindrops here and there. The streets were filled with Mercedes and BMWs and homes were in the process of renovation.

Peeking out the window of the crowded motel room, Greg Haworth, then only 8, wondered why he couldn’t ride in expensive cars like the people on the street did.

Haworth never had a cozy place to even call home because they were constantly moving from motel to motel due to lack of money. “It was all we could afford.”

“They (my parents) always spent their money on drugs. They knew we didn’t know and would never question it,” he said as he sighed disappointedly.

It was in the 9th grade that his friend Scott got him into wrestling. “ I never had any interest in wrestling or any other sport for that matter.” Since Scott encouraged him to show up for the first tryout, he’s fallen in love with it.

Haworth is now a senior and is the captain of his wrestling team. Though he says that he had never thought about wrestling, it has now become his only escape from the possible influences of the outside world.

Being the captain of a team, especially wrestling, is not as easy as it seems.

“Getting good grades is the No. 1 priority because without the grades, you will not get to wrestle. Coach can pull you out anytime and if you let one person down you let the whole team down.”

Though moving to Stockton was for the better, Haworth couldn’t fight the temptation.

“I always told myself not to do what my friends did, but I ended up doing what they did.”

Under peer pressure, he started ditching class and always having an excuse for every tardy he had. It almost made him ineligible to play because his grades started plummeting.

“I told myself to get it together. Don’t be dumb. Don’t be dumb.”

Getting it together meant not cutting classes even when he is tempted or trying to skip class by going to another class with a substitute. It was really time to get back on track with a little help.

“My grandma was really strict. She always made sure I did my homework after wrestling practice. It didn’t matter what I had to do, homework first.”

As a result of showing up to classes more frequently, his grades started getting better and better. He became a better student.

Senior English teacher Ron Acquisto said that Haworth is a great student. He gives that all-American boy image, one who plays sports and does well in school. “Greg is a wonderful student. He is very quiet in class and is always on task.”

Getting his life on track meant boosting up his confidence in matches. Junior year was his best year. He won 22 matches and lost 6. “It was really good.”

Not only did his life get better, his parents’ did as well. They were no longer in therapy for drugs. In fact, they even quit doing drugs. “They still drink every now and then, but no more drugs.”

Drugs broke his family apart. However, it also helped his parents come to the realization that their kids were everything. They had to either quit or give up custody of their kids forever. They chose the right path. “My mom lives with us now and she is much, much better than before. I feel like my life is on the top, especially when I have wrestling. Wrestling is my anti-drug.”

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