Undergrads’ nonprofit preps Central Valley teens for college success

The staff of Central Valley Scholars, a year-old nonprofit set up by UC Berkeley student Michael Piña (third from right), aims to help the valley's brightest, yet most marginalized, high school students get on track to attend top four-year universities like Berkeley. (Photo by Mirthica Suganthan) Growing up in the Central Valley town of Kerman, population 15,000, wasn't easy for Michael Piña, who self-identified as queer. Piña, who prefers the pronoun "she," suffered abuse from family, local youth and a Catholic priest who, at a church retreat, "threw holy water at me, trying to get the devil out of me," she said. "It caused a lot of emotional trauma." But in Fresno County, where less than 20% of all residents and less than 10% of Latinx residents have a bachelor's degree, academically talented Piña dreamed of becoming an attorney. So, one summer, in high school, Piña said she chose "to talk to no one. I focused on summer school and an internship and began to realize it didn't matter if I was queer. It was time to start being myself." In her senior year at Kerman High School, when officials wouldn't allow Piña to put the quote, "Yes, I dress nice.