CHICAGO -- Jayline Perez, 21, graduated three semesters early from Roosevelt University in December 2021. With her parents and grandparents only having gone through school as far as elementary school, she credits Rush Education and Career Hub, or REACH, with changing her future.
“I grew up kind of not really knowing that college was an option for me,” she said. “REACH was one of the only outlets I ever had besides my high school encouraging me to go to college.”
Now Perez is studying for the Medical College Admission Test and looking forward to a career in medicine. Neuroscience interests her, but she may change her mind. Perez is also working with her mentor, Dr. Susan Lopez, director of diversity, equity and inclusion for graduate medical education at Rush University Medical Center, helping with COVID-19 health disparities research (working with the data of COVID-19 patients to look at differences in outcomes by the need for Spanish interpretation) and organizing pre-med “boot camps” for Black and Latinx teens.
