Clarence Gomez is among the hundreds of students from De La Salle-College of St. Benilde who recently made their graduation march. Just like other LaSallian, Clarence also went through a lot of academic struggles. But unlike other LaSallians, he is not from a well-off family and never spent his weekend partying.
In his recent Facebook post, he reminisced the time when he asked his mother if he could still go to college amid their situation. He said that he could still remember the hardships and the sacrifices of his mother. When he was still a child, his mom left to work abroad and he was left under the care of his grandmother.
However, things changed when his grandmother died. They lost their house. His mother got sick as well so she had to stop working because of her poor health. They used whatever was left from his mother’s earnings abroad to finance their everyday expenses.
As a son, it’s hard for him to see his mother’s pains. When Clarence was in high school, he came to the point that he can never join the school activities unless one of his classmates pays for him. So when he heard from a friend that De La Salle University is offering a scholarship, he did not hesitate to apply.
He passed through a needle while he was applying for the scholarship but he did not lose hope. He finally landed a scholarship under the Office of Culture and Arts. However, the hard times did not stop there. As a student-artist, he had to spend 3-4 hours of practice, 3-4 times a week not mentioning that he had a GPA to reach, plates to produce, and exams to review for. It is exhausting, but he’s happy.
He had a lot to endure before he was conferred with a degree of Bachelor in Multimedia Arts, making his graduation sweeter.
Read his post below to learn more about his struggles on his journey towards finishing college.
