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Roberto Escobar lives his life by following a few simple principles he picked up from his mother — a single mother who immigrated to the United States from El Salvador with three children and supported the family by working as a housekeeper in New York City.

“The only role model I had — which was to be a hard worker every single day and that anything you were tasked out to do, try to do it to the best of your abilities — was my mom,” Escobar said. “I was raised on the mindset that you must earn every bit of it. Nothing will be handed to you.”

His mother’s example — combined with the support of a Marine Corps recruiter he met as a teenager — has guided Escobar through two decades as a Marine scout sniper and now to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, after transferring from Coastal Carolina Community College, to continue his undergraduate career.

Escobar hopes to use this new phase of his life to serve as a role model for the next generation, particularly for his family.

I’m the first one to graduate from high school in my immediate family — all my nephews and my niece have now graduated, and there’s two left that are about two or three years from graduating. That’s a huge move on up for an immigrant family from El Salvador. Slowly but surely, it’s getting there. I want to serve as an example for them.

Coming to Carolina may be the latest step in moving his family forward, but he has already spent most of his adult life using the lessons he learned from his mother to make a positive impact.

Discipline and structure

Escobar was 5 when his mother moved him and his two older sisters from El Salvador to Brooklyn, New York, in 1988. He and his mother lived in New York City until the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and then the two decided to join his sisters in Gainesville, Georgia, later that year.

With very few employment opportunities in his new town, Escobar — 18 at the time — began searching for a way out.

“I just couldn’t find myself there, and I was still angry inside for what happened in New York because New York was everything I’d ever known,” he said. “That caused me to enlist.”

The Marines weren’t his initial plan. He originally intended to enlist in the Army until the recruiter missed several appointments and he met Gunnery Sgt. Donald Milojevich, a Marine Corps recruiter who motivated and helped guide him to the Marines by telling Escobar it was the most disciplined and physically demanding of all the military branches.

“It piqued my interest because that’s what I really wanted. I wanted structure. I wanted discipline,” he said. “I wanted something worth getting up for every day, to do something that wasn’t your normal nine to five.”

By March 2002, after a few months of tutelage from the Milojevich, Escobar was at boot camp and shortly after attended Marines Scout Sniper School, where of the class of 24 Marines, he was one of just seven who graduated on their first attempt.

His new career got him out of Gainesville and provided him with a chance to serve his country.

Over the next 20 years, Escobar completed four combat tours to Afghanistan and Iraq, served as a sniper team leader, a Marine scout sniper instructor, a Marine recruiter in Hickory, North Carolina, a scout sniper platoon sergeant and completed a maritime patrol in the Pacific with the 31^st Marine Expeditionary Unit. He also served as an urban leaders course chief and worked as a training chief and camp commandant at the School of Infantry East Marine Training Battalion.

The Marines weren’t his initial plan. He originally intended to enlist in the Army until the recruiter missed several appointments and he met Gunnery Sgt. Donald Milojevich, a Marine Corps recruiter who motivated and helped guide him to the Marines by telling Escobar it was the most disciplined and physically demanding of all the military branches.

“It piqued my interest because that’s what I really wanted. I wanted structure. I wanted discipline,” he said. “I wanted something worth getting up for every day, to do something that wasn’t your normal nine to five.”

By March 2002, after a few months of tutelage from the Milojevich, Escobar was at boot camp and shortly after attended Marines Scout Sniper School, where of the class of 24 Marines, he was one of just seven who graduated on their first attempt.

His new career got him out of Gainesville and provided him with a chance to serve his country.

Over the next 20 years, Escobar completed four combat tours to Afghanistan and Iraq, served as a sniper team leader, a Marine scout sniper instructor, a Marine recruiter in Hickory, North Carolina, a scout sniper platoon sergeant and completed a maritime patrol in the Pacific with the 31^st Marine Expeditionary Unit. He also served as an urban leaders course chief and worked as a training chief and camp commandant at the School of Infantry East Marine Training Battalion.

The purpose was to give back to this country that’s given me so much as an immigrant child. I may not have been born here, but I’m going to protect everything that it has given me so that it continues to give it to others. To me, this is the land of opportunity. You just have to apply yourself.

Finding his second career

During his final assignment at Camp Lejeune in Jacksonville, North Carolina, Escobar began to plan for what would come after the Marines and enrolled at Coastal Carolina Community College, where he completed his associate’s degree while finishing up his enlistment.

“My career was coming to an end, and I really wanted to find out what I was passionate about,” Escobar said. “I definitely know that education is something I was very passionate about.”

In May, just a few months after retiring from the Marine Corps as a staff sergeant, Escobar walked at his community college’s graduation with his mother in the crowd. It was a big moment for his family — particularly for the woman who set the course in motion in 1988.

“I wanted to show her that her sacrifice to come here wasn’t all for nothing,” said Escobar, who helped his mother retire at 64 around the same time by buying her a house in Gainesville, allowing her to enjoy her senior years.

When it came to figuring out what would come next after his associate’s degree, Carolina was high on the list of next stops. Though Escobar was accepted to several other top-tier universities, a tour of campus with his mother sold him on the decision to attend UNC-Chapel Hill this fall to study psychology in the College of Arts and Sciences as preparation for attending medical school.

Even though the tour was the final selling point, it was also a reminder of an upcoming reality: Escobar will be significantly older than most of the new students arriving on campus this week. He says he plans on leaning into that and hopes to provide a new perspective.

For the new Tar Heel, it is also an opportunity to be a positive role model for more people.

“I’m really looking forward to being able to sit around and have good conversations with students, build good relationships,” he said. “Hopefully, I can give and guide the younger students into letting them know, ‘Hey, you put in a little bit of hard work now, and it’ll pay dividends in the future.’”

Story courtesy of UNC.edu.

Carolina alumnus and C-STEP student Roy Dawson

Being able to transfer to UNC as a group allowed me to feel a part of the Carolina Community almost immediately.

I had been a short order cook, video store clerk, manufacturing plant worker, lube shop manager, and a meat delivery driver before learning about the Carolina Student Transfer Excellence Program (C-STEP).

I was a high school dropout with eight years of moving from job to job when I found my way to Alamance Community College in 2007. I had been attending ACC in pursuit of an Associate Degree in Computer Science. It was in an English course where I read a personal essay aloud to the class that prompted Professor Maria Baskins to ask me if I would be interested in C-STEP. Not long later, I was Carolina bound.

C-STEP is a program that guarantees students admission to UNC provided they meet certain criteria such as cumulative GPA requirements, among other things. One of the first things I noticed about Carolina was the size of the campus. There was a learning curve with regarding to navigating campus as compared to community college. This transition was made easier with C-STEP.

C-STEP allowed me to transfer to UNC with a group of friends who helped each other. We shared information such as how to find the bus schedule, how do the meal plans work, and how do we get tickets to the basketball games?

Classes at UNC were challenging and exciting. I remember how cool it was to be taught by professors who literally wrote the text book for the class. I made sure to take advantage of classroom discussions. My perspective as a non-traditional student was always welcomed.

After graduating from UNC in 2011, I enrolled in UNC Law, graduating in 2014. I am now an attorney practicing in Eastern North Carolina. It was in C-STEP that I met my wife, Dayla. We were married in 2011 and we are expecting our first child this Summer. C-STEP changed my life.

Written by Roy Dawson, UNC ’11 and UNC School of Law ’14

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When Mary Grace was in her late teens, a four-year college was out of reach. Roadblocks to higher education were everywhere.

“It was the ’70s, and we couldn’t figure out the money or the path,” she said. “I was one of eight children, and I had to make my way. In my world, a young woman would not often be seen as someone with those possibilities.”

Grace, who is now 64, grew up in a family with strong faith, which led to a heart for service. She also developed a deep commitment to social justice. As she followed those callings, she found a lifetime of education. She’s been an activist, a mother, a teacher, a student and a world traveler.

And, now, she’s a Carolina student.

When I get to campus, I’ll have a button on my backpack that says: ‘I’m old and learning new stuff.’

And, the student body might learn a thing or two from her.

After earning an associate’s degree in physical therapy in 1976, Grace joined the United Farmworkers Union to work in Washington, D.C., and California as an organizer.

“That was all such an education – in American history and labor, Chicano history, agricultural and immigration disparities, and diversity. I saw it all just because I said ‘yes’ to this life. This context of living history was fascinating. We were working so hard to make real what most of us say we believe in – peace and justice.”

Carolina Student Mary Grace holds a heart-shaped sign that reads "Love is the only solution."

Grace met her husband, Sebastian, when he successfully represented her after she was illegally arrested for free speech outside the Pentagon. Sebastian also took a different First Amendment case to the Supreme Court after Grace and a friend had been threatened with arrest. In 1983, they won United States v. Grace, which struck down a federal statute prohibiting picketing and the distribution of leaflets on the public sidewalks surrounding the Supreme Court.

Grace continued her work in activism, visiting Iraq to observe nonviolent conflict resolution in a war zone and teaching English in South Sudan. She later returned to South Sudan to volunteer with a women’s fair-trade cooperative and helped organize a conversation with administrators and educators on public schooling in South Sudan, specifically integrating alternatives to violence and war.

“I’ve had all these adventures. One adventure after the other. I’m ready for more.”

Four years ago, Sebastian was diagnosed with cardiac amyloidosis, a chronic condition. They moved to Durham so he could be treated at Duke University, and so they could be closer to their children, who are both high school teachers in Durham, and their grandchildren.

Grace just completed her second associate degree at Durham Technical Community College, where she received numerous awards. When it was time to transfer to a university, she had her choice of a number of top schools.

She found herself drawn to Carolina, she said, “because the staff were exceptionally engaging, affirming, and exceedingly helpful in all interactions.”

She said that Carolina has the vital combination of professional knowledge and skills with personal interest and connection. She is excited about using the interdisciplinary studies major to craft her own education, as she’s done for so long.

“I plan to create my own major around studying trauma and resilience, with a likely minor in conflict resolution. Because of what I’ve seen across the world, and what I know now about science and health, I’m really interested in adverse childhood experiences and how they affect the body itself – the ability to think and learn and heal. I need to study more and use what I learn to continue to be more helpful to my community. We experience what I see as very stressful times in our world, and healing connections with each other are key. “

Grace will start this fall with Carolina Away, a program for first-year and transfer students that will allow her to take her courses online and participate in small-group experiences with classmates, faculty, and staff.

Over the summer, she’s kept her eye on the kinds of opportunities Carolina is offering for students and alumni to engage in discourse around racism, equality, the Black Lives Matter movement, and other issues of justice for which she’s been working her whole life.

“I’m looking forward to being part of these kinds of engagements with other students. I’m well-rooted in this work, but to see this being offered to young people at such pivotal points in their lives is heartening,” she said. “I’m profoundly excited to be in a place where I can witness young people engaging in this way. Working for good – that’s where we have to put our hope.”

Story courtesy of UNC.edu.

My transition from community college definitely had its ups and downs, but the people I met through C-STEP are some of my favorite people here, and they definitely made things a lot easier.

Kolby Hunter, UNC ’19

Meet a New Tar Heel: Roberto Escobar

Discipline and structure

Finding his second career

Interested in C-STEP?

Kolby Hunter, UNC ’19

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Meet a New Tar Heel: Roberto Escobar

Discipline and structure

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