From Dreams to Reality : 300 Don Caps and Gowns for a Short but Sweet Ceremony at Ventura College

Both Teresa Likes and her 5-year-old son, Nicholas, are now graduates of Ventura College--even though he finished before she did.

With a flip of the tassel and a symbolic pronouncement Thursday afternoon by outgoing college President Jesus Carreon, Likes, 33, had finished what she began 13 years ago by returning to school for her associate of arts degree.

And Nicholas, well, he “graduated” from the college’s preschool a couple of years ago and is now flourishing in kindergarten.

“I guess you could call him sort of an alumni,” said the Santa Paula mother of two after nearly 300 graduates collected diploma covers at the college’s 65th commencement exercises. More than 600 other students, who chose not to participate in the commencement, are also expected to graduate this month. “I feel wonderful. Now that I’m older and had children and came back to college, it just means more to me. I don’t think I appreciated college before.”

The single mother joined the hundreds of other beaming and relieved graduates as they filed into the college’s gym, packed with nearly 3,000 celebrants, to march across the stage.

The ceremony, a model of efficiency and planning, ended just a little more than an hour after it began.

But sandwiched in that hour was a traditional ceremony, replete with all the trappings.

The Ventura College Orchestra played “Pomp and Circumstance” as the faculty and the graduates--to rousing applause, hoots, hollers and cheers--took their seats under the banner proclaiming the Pirates 1994 state basketball champions.

Those in the creaking bleachers and the graduates, too, sang softly as the national anthem was played, voices just audible above the orchestra.

Armed with cameras and video cameras, the appointed historians of the graduation ceremony sprang up and down throughout the audience, capturing images of those they had come to honor. Spectators yelped and shouted out names, and waved from the floor and bleachers.

“This is the reality that began the dream,” said Carreon as he addressed the graduates. “The hard work, the long hours, the missing of meals, the studying it takes to get to this point. But it all comes down to a dream.

“This is very important. This is what life is all about,” he continued. “This is what America stands for. . . . Continue to follow your dreams. Don’t let anyone or anything change that opportunity.”

Moments later, he concluded: “I declare that the appropriate degrees be conferred.”

The procession began. Names were read from the index cards handed to the announcer as the graduates crossed the stage, collecting a handshake and diploma cover. And then it was done.

Done but for the awarding of an honorary degree to Martin Hansen, a 92-year-old retired Ventura businessman who, upon his death, has bequeathed to the college $500,000 for a scholarship fund to help provide tuition for college graduates who go on to a four-year university.

Next to the gym, the campus center patio was filled with blue gowns and beaming relatives, friend and loved ones, as hugs were exchanged amid the sound of snapping camera shutters.

“It was hard to balance everything,” said George Zurita, 29, of Santa Paula as he held daughter Mayra to his chest, her arms clasped around his neck. Zurita, a father of four, graduated from a collaborative program that Toyota, local dealerships and the college offer to give students a grounding in automotive mechanics.

He used to work in electronics assembly, but when the second company he worked for folded, he decided to take the risk and change professions. “I took it as a sign,” he said, adding that he hopes someday to earn a master’s in business administration.

Amid the sea of blue was Virginia Velasco, surrounded by a throng of at least 15 relatives, all grinning.

“It’s quite an accomplishment,” Velasco, 20, of Oxnard, said. The first of her six siblings and the only one among her friends who decided to go to college, she plans to attend Cal State Long Beach and work toward a degree in business administration.

“It was hard, but I’m there,” she said. “I looked at my family and how hard they have to work, and saw the opportunity for me to go to college. And I thought I should take it.”