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>> I chose Sociology because I love society.  I love culture.  I'm hoping to help transform society through what I'm learning in Sociology and going back into my own culture, helping out people who have kind of been raised up in the same demographics I have, showing the importance of education.  I go and speak at rehabilitation centers.  Sometimes they're youth rehabilitation centers.  Sometimes they're for adults, for mainly men, just speaking life into them, letting them know that, come on, you can do it.  You made mistakes and what better of an example than me.  I believed in myself when I got out of prison three and a half years ago, but I didn't believe in myself.  It's allowing my perspective and my goals and my aspirations to be taken to a level I never thought possible.  CSUSB has helped me not just to educate myself, but emotionally, mentally and even spiritually I grow here at CSUSB.  With the Prison Education Project, I was blessed to be brought aboard.  What we do is we're educating incarcerated young adults.  They can be from 17 to sometimes 20 years old and what we're educating them is college literacy, financial literacy, life coping skills, soft skills, communication skills, and the benefits of coming to college.  CSUSB is helping me achieve my goals above and beyond.  I can even say, not just educationally, but socially the people that I've had in my life, like Jesse Felix.  He's been a great mentor.  He's been a great guide.  I'm part of the board of directors at SMSU.  
>> Eric has been impactful since the first day I saw him.  I was instantly drawn to his drive, which made it someone that I was really looking forward to working with.  Every time we'd have an event, Eric would walk up and introduce himself to everyone at the table and really, really get connected.  And then to see him step into this space in the board of directors to see how driven he is to serve students, I'm really looking to seeing how he impacts the future of our campus because he's in it to win it.
>> I'm a student representative and we just oversee that the students are getting what they need.  That's why I joined it.  No matter your color, no matter your gender, no matter your age or disability, documented or undocumented, that we all have an equal opportunity here.  This is our school.  To be a first generation student means a lot to me. I feel proud.  The reason why I love CSUSB is because it's transforming my life.  My name is Eric Tafoya.  I love CSUSB and I'm going to be a Coyote for life.  
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