Dr. Terrie Garcia’s parents were migrant farm workers. Her father graduated from high school and her mom had a sixth-grade education. Nobody in her life had any experience with the higher education system when she first enrolled in an associate’s degree program at San Antonio College in Texas.
Years later, Garcia holds a Ph.D. after an accomplished career as a nurse and an educator. She has also helped hundreds of other students have an easier time walking the very path she did — from first-generation student to successful professional.
“I share my lived experience with them because I think it’s important for them to see role models,” says Garcia, the College of Nursing’s director of inclusive excellence and student success. “Education will take you very far, and I want students to see themselves in me and know that they’re able to do that as well.”
Garcia built a program that has allowed students to do just that: Project BEYOND-2. Started in 2007, Project BEYOND-2 is meant to increase the number of underrepresented nurses in the profession so that healthcare providers could better serve diverse communities. Its first class had five students. The program now serves roughly 170 per year.
Part of Project BEYOND-2’s expansion is owed to the partnerships it has formed with community organizations. One of its most prominent collaborators is All-In Milwaukee, a nonprofit focused on college completion and career development for limited-income Milwaukee students. Scholars have access to personalized advising, career coaching, community-building opportunities and scholarship support of up to $12,000 over four years of college.
Marquette Nursing is the best nursing school that we work with, not just because of the national rankings, but because we have access to the leadership and they take our feedback seriously
Irving Ibarra, Director of Strategic Partnerships at All-In Milwaukee
Irving Ibarra, All-In Milwaukee’s director of strategic partnerships, hopes to reverse the “brain drain” that either keeps talented young people from reaching their full potential or sends them away from Milwaukee.
“This is a segregated city, and the experience of Black and brown students is often one where they don’t see themselves in the leadership or opportunities reflected in town. We want to change that,” Ibarra says.
Sometimes, a lot of change can come from small adjustments. Ibarra got feedback from Marquette nursing students that getting through the first year of the curriculum was difficult specifically because its two hardest classes — biochemistry and anatomy and physiology — both happened in the same semester. This insight mirrored that of the Marquette faculty and staff who work most closely with first-year students.
Due to this shared understanding of potential barriers, courses were changed such that biochemistry is second semester, and that the anatomy and physiology course is split into two courses across two semesters. The change has had a positive impact on student success.
“Marquette Nursing is the best nursing school that we work with, not just because of the national rankings, but because we have access to the leadership and they take our feedback seriously,” Ibarra says. “I tell students that if they want to be a nurse, there’s no better place for them to go than Marquette.”
Students like Stacy Ramirez Alanis, a junior and a first-generation college student who was born and raised in Milwaukee, are reaping the rewards of this partnership. She recalled initially feeling out of place in a high school where most of her peers’ siblings and parents had gone to college. All-In Milwaukee helped Ramirez ease the financial burden of attending college, while Project BEYOND-2 gave her a broader group of peers to relate to than she had prior to attending Marquette.
“Both of them came together to form who I am today, which is very different from my freshman year self. I feel like I can comfortably go up to future employers and talk with them because of the things I learned at All-In Milwaukee career fairs, and that underlying confidence has come from working with advisers in PB2,” Ramirez says.
“They’re both really good support systems,” says fellow junior nursing student Gissell Arenal-Copto. “In Project BEYOND, you’re getting help from nurses and they only mentor nursing students, so they can provide you with a lot more than a general tutor can. And All-In helped me with the FAFSA, my college essay, college tours — all kinds of things.”
The support available to first-generation nurses at Marquette has produced multiple impressive alumni. Jasmine Hernandez, Nurs ’20, is now studying to be a nurse anesthetist. Dr. Christian Villanueva, Nurs ’15, won a Young Alumnus of the Year award for both his excellence in practice and his volunteering work at a camp for people with phenylketonuria, a rare genetic disorder.
Hundreds have similar stories: arrive as they are at Marquette, depart transformed and then use their education to transform others.
This arc is not just a fulfillment of a personal journey: it’s also a vital one for these nurses’ patients, as Garcia can personally attest.
“My own mother is primarily Spanish speaking, and she would just light up whenever a healthcare provider was able to speak Spanish; it made her so much more comfortable,” Garcia says. “Studies have shown that people who look like the communities they’re serving improve health outcomes, and that’s why our work is important.”
In two years, Ramirez and Arenal-Copto will graduate. Arenal-Copto specifically wants to work in pediatric oncology. They walk a path paved by organizations like All-In Milwaukee and Project BEYOND-2, and people who don’t even know they will need a nurse’s help will one day benefit from the skill, courage and persistence of these Marquette Nurses.
