Student Takes Graduation Pics in the Field Where Her Parents Work To Remind Us That Hard Work Always Pays Off

To show that hard effort pays off, a student took her graduation photos in the field where her parents labor.

Jennifer Rocha’s graduation photographs provide a touching tribute to her parents.

By photographing her in the fields where they labor…

Rocha noted that her parents, who are from Michoacan, Mexico, were “not lucky enough to live their aspirations of seeking a higher education and obtaining the dream career they wished” in a piece of writing uploaded on UC San Diego’s Facebook page.

As a result, when she was in high school, her “parents informed me that working as a migrant field worker was the only way I would be able to comprehend how vital it was to pursue a higher education was to work as a migrant field worker.”

While still in high school, Rocha began working in the fields with her parents.

“To go labor in the fields overnight,” her father would pick her up.

“We’d plant strawberries, get off about 2-3 a.m., and get ready at 5 a.m., otherwise I’d miss the city bus,” she explained.

Rocha “admired” the workers because they “continued working despite backaches while flies, mosquitos, and bugs were buzzing around their faces, going into their eyes.”

“No one thinks about or observes what happens behind the scenes of a grocery shop vegetable,” she wrote. “However, behind it is someone who works in the fields every day, breaking their backs.”

“Even after I had left for college on weekends or during breaks,” Rocha continued to labor in the field.

She “had to commute from distant distances like Oceanside and Lakeside” because her parents couldn’t afford for her to have a room at school.

“Working two jobs, commuting, and going to school at the same time was a challenge. I wanted to quit up several times, but it was my parents’ words of encouragement and love that kept me going.”

“Coming from a field worker background” has encouraged Rocha to “work hard as my parents took my sisters and I to the fields to realize how arduous labor is,” she added.

“Working in the fields grows and shapes a different type of character,” Rocha concluded as her writing came to a close. A character that never gives up and has the resilience and strength to face the dangers that come with the profession.”