Cohort Stories: Meet Angel
vol. 4, no. 8 — guest post by Angel Valdez-Martinez
Growing up in a tough environment, you either succumb to the vices around you or create your own path. I was raised by an overworked, single mother struggling to make ends meet in Lawrence, Massachusetts. While struggling to provide for my brothers and I, my mom had many jobs, so I had to be independent for as long as I can remember. Being an extremely curious boy, I always knew what was happening around me, both the good and bad. Instead of pursuing the lifestyle of others around me, I had decided I was going to invest my curiosity into academics. My love for learning started the path I’m on today.
The curiosity turned into an obsession to learn pretty much anything I could because it was the only thing that kept me distracted from my environment. This love for learning made sure I always did well in school and meant I was always looking for the next challenge.
In the second grade, I was skipped to the grade above and my mom gifted me my first video game console. I immediately fell in love with video games, as they were seemingly the best way to escape my reality. I loved them so much that I told everybody I wanted to be a video game designer knowing nothing about video game development. I wanted to create video games not only because I loved them, but because I was always interested in how they were made.
Though I didn’t know what coding was, I was always motivated by the essential question, how does this work? My hunger to answer this question was what made me fall in love with technology. Unfortunate financial circumstances meant that I wasn’t always able to get everything I wanted, so that meant I would spend a lot of time using the internet and Google to see all the different technology at the time. Whether it was cars, smartphones, video game consoles, cameras, or computers, I would watch countless videos and read articles on what made them work. This interest eventually led me to discover engineering. It only made sense to fall in love with this field because of my interest in technology and my need to know how things work. I found that as a Computer Engineer, I would be able to create and implement computer software and hardware that is extremely useful and beneficial to many people.
Discovering the endless possibilities that came with Engineering motivated me to want to use it to help others and change the world for the better. This background made me naturally choose Computer Science as a major even before attending Saint Anselm College. While I was always interested in technology and engineering, I never really had anywhere to look when it came to this industry.
Coming from a poor, blue-collar family, I didn’t know anyone who worked in this profession to guide me or give me professional advice. On top of that, I never saw anybody in my community joining the innovation industry. This motivated me to become that person that others like me can look up to.
This is one of the reasons Hack.Diversity excites me so much. I strongly believe in their mission to get underrepresented minorities into this crucial industry and am excited to use my time to become a person of reference for those people and meet others like me. I envision my time at Hack.Diversity supporting me to create my own path through technology. Whether it be through creating or implementing, I can use the skills I learn to make a change in the world.
