“My father is in a wheelchair after a car accident 29 years ago. He damaged his spinal cord and is paralyzed from the waist down. Because I’ve gone with my dad to appointments and have seen his struggles and success, I want to go into kinesiology specifically for physical therapy.”

Xochitl Rojas

LIFE ACADEMY | FACES FOR THE FUTURE

Staying alive—it is magical to me.

I’ve always liked helping people when it comes to their health. My father is in a wheelchair after a car accident 29 years ago. He damaged his spinal cord and is paralyzed from the waist down. Me and my mom do everything for him.

Because I’ve gone with my dad to appointments and have seen his struggles and success, I want to go into kinesiology specifically for physical therapy. There is a new program called ReWalk. It starts by walking with crutches and then patients get robotic boots. These new technologies provide opportunities and enable us to rethink our whole lives.

My current internship program, FACES for the Future, is focused on mental and behavioral health. I am at Bonita House, which helps homeless people with addictions find housing. It’s not like an emergency medical response class — its more hands-on because we have a lot of workshops, too. Everyone in that class is CPR-certified and we also did a training with law enforcement. It was training for real-world situations.

I’m in high school and I’ve already taken college courses and internships where I can network and get to know others. I never thought I would get the opportunity to do what I saw my friends in college doing. And the fact that I get to help them makes me happy because there’s one less person that’s dying.