Meet Wendy
Wheaton High School, Class of 2011
University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Class of 2015
“No one in my family had gone to college and I had the support and the opportunity to go. The staff made me feel like they were happy to have me.”
As a junior in high school, Wendy Ayala was already acting as the head of her household. Both Wendy and her mother suffer from lupus. As Wendy grew up, her mother’s condition steadily deteriorated. Much of Wendy’s time and energy was devoted to taking her mother to doctor appointments, acting as her translator and caregiver. She helped to maintain the household and care for her younger sister, all while balancing her own health concerns.
Despite her other responsibilities, Wendy was active at school. She joined the Student Government Association and the homecoming committee and played field hockey. She also dreamed of continuing her education. She knew college would be a challenge; that’s why her high school counselor suggested applying to CDI. CDI would give Wendy the support she needed to get to and through college, support that she especially needed because she was already doing so much to help her family. “I had something to prove,” she said. “No one in my family had gone to college and I had the support and the opportunity to go. I was excited because they were excited,” Wendy remembers. “The staff made me feel like they were happy to have me.” In addition to helping her prepare for standardized tests and research colleges, CDI counselors helped Wendy stay on track with her high school assignments, and coordinated with her school counselors when she was absent for health reasons.
CDI walked Wendy through the research and financial aid process, providing the guidance her family was not always able to. Location and size were key factors in her college choice. She wanted to be able to have one-on-one interactions with her professors, and she needed to remain close to home. Wendy fell in love with UMBC and remembers jumping for joy when she received her acceptance letter.
Her love for UMBC only grew when she got on campus. She loved the area, the many new activities, and her classes. She also continued to work to support her family and her education. Then, the time came when the financial burden was just too great. She knew that even with loans, grants, and scholarships, she could no longer cover the full cost of tuition.
For many low-income, first-generation students, this would be the end of the story. Many students leave school to work to pay off debt and never return. Fortunately, Wendy had CDI’s support. Together with her CDI counselor, Wendy made a plan to spend a semester at Montgomery College, where she could take courses with little cost out of pocket and save to return to UMBC. Tracy stayed in close touch with Wendy, making sure she was on track and would be in good shape when she began classes at UMBC again. After a semester off, Wendy was back on the campus that she loved.
As a college senior, she interned at the Baltimore Mayor’s Office for Employment Development, while balancing classes and a job. With a lot of effort, she graduated—on time—with a bachelor’s degree in sociology and anthropology. Following graduation she began working in the mayor’s office and, with CDI’s continued support, is planning to go to graduate school for public administration.
Students like Wendy possess the intelligence and the drive to succeed in college, but their other obligations can make completing their education difficult. CDI is privileged to be the support these students need to get to college graduation and beyond.
After completing a double major in sociology and anthropology, Wendy joined the CDI team as an administrative assistant, and currently serves as program manager of the Scholars Program.
