Alejandro“Success is just knowing it- knowing everything you do, learning how to do this and learning how to do that.”


Alejandro is 19 and already a husband and a father to a 7-month-old son, his namesake who they call Alex, but he takes it all in stride. His motto, it seems, since he says it all the time is “You’ve got to work with what you’ve got.”

When Alejandro was 3 years old, he was diagnosed with lung cancer and spent years in and out of hospitals undergoing radiation, which most likely impaired some aspects of his development. “My heart doesn’t pump as well anymore because of the long-term effects of the medicine,” he explains. “I’ve just got to calm down, no stress,” which explains his even-tempered demeanor and his steady outlook of life.

After graduating from high school, Alejandro is headed to DeVry to study electronics and computer technology, because even though he is in special education classes—he has trouble with reading comprehension— Alejandro loves math (“math is easy to learn”) and lives to tinker with electronics. “My wife, she says I’m always on the computer or on the Xbox, I’m always with technology,” he says smiling, later adding, “It’s second nature to me, technology. And technology will never burn out.”

As an only child, Alejando grew up in the same house he lives in today—a rarity among his classmates— and hopes to own it himself and live there with his wife and son when his parents move back to Mexico after he graduates from DeVry. And although he is surrounded by a culture of drug dealers and guns, Alejandro says he’s never taken part of any of it. “I’ve seen it, I’ve touched it, but I’ve never used it,” he says.

As for married life, Alejandro doesn’t feel the pressure of his young age yet. Once he found out his girlfriend was pregnant, it seemed natural to immediately get married. And even though his now-wife’s parents thought they were too young, they did make it official four days before their baby was born. “It’s a good partnership. We work together to accomplish goals. It’s like a whole football team, but it’s just us,” he says.

Above all, Alejandro is practical. School, he says, offers more opportunities and more advantages than menial labor. “Instead of $6 or $7 an hour and the whole week you make less than $200, I could do a [computer] job for $500 for only two days. I mean, what’s the point? You can pay bills faster than that [hourly wage job].”