MJC Alumna Becomes UC Regent

There will be a new regent on the University of California Board during the 2021-22 school year – and she is a proud Modesto Junior College graduate!

Her name is Alexis Atsilvsgi Zaragoza, and she is currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree in geography at UC Berkeley. But she considers MJC her “home.”

“I would be nowhere without MJC,” she exclaims. “When I first left high school, my grades weren’t good enough to get into a four-year school. I always thought that was my fault, but I’ve since learned that I was disadvantaged due to a lack of resources and low-income status. So, when I came to school in Modesto, and had mentors, tutoring and programs designed to help me succeed – and believe in myself – I feel like my life turned around. People might look at my Berkeley degree once I complete it and be impressed, but my real success came from the institution that gave me a fighting chance – MJC!”

One of 83 candidates, Zaragoza became the 47th student regent-designate, a position established in 1975. Chosen via a rigorous multi-faceted process, she will be able to participate in all deliberations and vote when her one-year term begins in July 2021.

Zaragoza, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, belonging to the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, and daughter of a Mexican immigrant, graduated from Patterson High School. While at MJC, she was active in several clubs; was a keynote speaker at the college’s Hispanic Education Conference; and served as a senator, director of political development, and vice president of the Associated Students.

In June 2018 Zaragoza was appointed to the California Community Colleges Board of Governors. Now, she will become the first student in MJC history to serve as an MJC student leader, a California Community Colleges Board of Governors member, and a UC student regent.

“This is so important – and not just for me,” Zaragoza says. “Not a lot of people from rural areas get representation on these types of boards. It is important that people have an understanding of transfer students who make up half the population of the UC system – and being a product of California Community Colleges, specifically MJC which helped me figure out who I wanted to be, puts me in a unique position to give back and serve. I am honored and grateful.”

As student regent, Zaragoza wants to use her background to help improve campus climate as well as student, faculty and staff diversity and inclusion at UC.