Reflections and Advice  

EAOP, DCAC, Matriculate, Tech's Sat Prep: Ahmed participated in EAOP, DCAC, Matriculate, and SAT preparation provided by Oakland Technical High School– all of these programs are reserved for low-income and/or first generation students to move towards higher education. From his freshman to senior year, Ahmed was in the Early Academic Outreach Program, a program founded by the University of California geared to support first-generation, socioeconomically disadvantaged, and/or English-language learners in reaching post-secondary education and opportunities. His EAOP mentor planned out his courses for his four years of high school. Ahmed explains, “I wouldn't have been able to overcome the obstacles that I faced as a first-generation student if I didn’t have that guidance and mentorship, it was so important to me.” In his sophomore and junior years, Ahmed had access to SAT tutoring through his school, however this was only accessible for a limited number of students. He compares these resources to those that he had as an 8th grade student at Head Royce and that his younger sister still had as she attended the school. He says, “my counselor at Tech had about 500 students. At Head Royce, counselors have 5-20 students each,” and continued “my sister has to be on the outskirts, socially, but she has well funded clubs and top notch classroom materials and science-related resources. I never even had a lab for my science class at Tech. I had a much better highschool experience socially, but academically, I would have had better resources if I had stayed at Head Royce.” During the stressful months of the college application process, Ahmed explains that Matriculate paired him with an advisor who served as his one-on-one mentor, helping him write and revise his college essays.