Moving to College - Kevin Hidalgo

Kevin Hidalgo: My name is Kevin Hidalgo. I'm from Harlem. Tomorrow, I'll be moving into college. Pretty much for 18 years, I lived on the same block. It's 140th Street and Broadway. I finished high school as a salutatorian. I was second place. I ended up getting the highest honors in math and history. I think I ended high school on a good note. College was always emphasized. High school wasn't the end. My dad's dream school for me was Harvard, because that's the only school that he heard of. I applied early decision to the University of Pennsylvania, the Wharton School, and I got in.

Speaker 2: [foreign language 00:00:50]

Speaker 3: [foreign language 00:00:54]

Kevin Hidalgo: That day, I will never forget how me, and my dad cried.

Bart Rosenthal: When I heard from Kevin that he got into U Penn Wharton, I was ecstatic. I'm Bart Rosenthal, and I'm Kevin's mentor. We've been in our match for two years now. 

Kevin Hidalgo: My initial plan of getting to college was taking a bus with my whole family, and each of them carrying two pieces of luggage. As the summer went by, I talked to Bart. He was like, "How you getting to college?"

Bart Rosenthal: And originally, I was like, "Bus? What are you talking about?" And then it dawned on me that, living in the city, almost no one has cars, so the whole moving in process that was typical of a New Jersey family was not the same of that of a city family, and I thought it was very important that his parents got to leave him off, and to be able to spend that day with him.

Kevin Hidalgo: And he was like, "Would you like me to drive you there?" And I was like, "Yeah, that would be really helpful."

Bart Rosenthal: Hey, Kevin!

Kevin Hidalgo:Hey, Bart!

Bart Rosenthal: How's it going?

Kevin Hidalgo: Good.

Bart Rosenthal: Good to see you.

Kevin Hidalgo: You too.

Bart Rosenthal: I took a day off work, and I rented a minivan, and the Hidalgo family and myself drove to Pennsylvania. I had to go pick it up at [inaudible 00:02:10].

Speaker 2: Okay.

Bart Rosenthal: Is that everything Kevin?

Kevin Hidalgo: Yeah, I feel like we're done here. 

Bart Rosenthal: Yeah.

Kevin Hidalgo: Ready to go to Philly. Yeah. 

Bart Rosenthal: Ready for Philly? Look, there it is. Look. There's Philly.

Kevin Hidalgo: Philly! My city for the next four years. I just want to get to my room and actually see it. 

Automated: Your destination is on the left.

Kevin Hidalgo: Right there. I'm the first one to go to college from my family and I'm very proud about that because I get to pave the way for my other two brothers. 

Speaker 2: [foreign language 00:02:57]

Kevin Hidalgo: Ah the last room. This is the size of my old room and I don't have to share with my brothers anymore. My room. Let's go. I feel like if you don't have a parent that didn't go to college pretty much your family's inexperienced in that whole process. So having a mentor is really helpful. Like how Bart was. He helped me with the common app essays because I had trouble in writing. Then also just, well motivation, telling me that the end is close. 

 Bart is a great person. Honestly I feel like there's no other mentor that I could have had the same relationship with. He's very honest and he understands me. I'm definitely going to be in contact with Bart all through my four years. I feel like the advice that I'm asking him is social, because I've never been in that big melting pot of different students, when Bart has been there.

Bart Rosenthal: Kevin has definitely been a big part of my life, and I'd see him being a part of it for the years to come. And I definitely think iMentor made the connection. They made us sit down the first few days, talk about things in the pamphlets, but after a while, that's not all you talk about. You can't stop talking. And you talk about academics, you talk about how you're doing personally, family. We're communicating a lot and I definitely see that only going up from here. My advice to Kevin for the first day of school is just to enjoy it. And I think college, those four years are some of the best four years of your life. Working hard, keeping up with that, but also giving yourself some time to relax and enjoy the college experience. 

Kevin Hidalgo: [foreign language 00:05:06] okay. [foreign language 00:05:08] okay.

Speaker 3:  [foreign language 00:05:13]

Kevin Hidalgo: Okay. [foreign language 00:05:15]

Speaker 2: [foreign language 00:05:17]

Kevin Hidalgo: [foreign language 00:05:34] Bye. 

 Thank you Bart for everything and for bringing my family here. 

Bart Rosenthal: Of course. You're welcome. As far as Kevin's future, I'm super excited for what lies ahead. I know Kevin is going to be doing incredible things, and I know and feel really confident in the future in the fact that Kevin, no matter where he wants to go, he going to get there. He won't have it any other way.

Kevin Hidalgo: Yeah. No.