TRANSCRIPT:

It’s a warm evening here as the Rodarte family sit down to share a meal. Five of the seven brothers and sisters are visiting their parents today. They’re bustling around the large, bright kitchen, serving enchiladas and fresh Agua de Jamaica. The house is situated in the farm worker city of Delano. It’s surrounded by the same fields where generations of Rodartes have dedicated their lives to earn a humble living.

Delta: “I remember washing our clothes in the river, having to pull our water from the water well, having to carry it with a big old stick with buckets on the side, having to fetch. I mean it was interesting having to do all these things to help. Having to collect the, what was it, cow manure?”

Leticia: “We used it as starter fire I guess.”

Delta: “Once it dries up we pick it up and put it in the sack and use it as starter fire to cook.”

The life of an immigrant farm worker is harsh; the sweltering heat, the long hours, the maltreatment from the labor contractors… It’s what helped fuel the Latino civil rights movement. After all, many of the immigrants are here illegally, and therefore much more susceptible to exploitation. It’s no wonder then that Delano became the capital of the United Farm-workers Union, and its iconic leader Cesar Chavez.

Delta Duran Rodarte is the second eldest daughter. As a child, she watched her mother work 12 hour shifts in the California fields. And her mother continued to work, even at 8 months pregnant. Delta and her older sister experienced first-hand the tough conditions.

Delta: “They kind of mistreated people. And, of course, me being a high school student and knowing the language, I didn’t appreciate that. But everybody else, like my parents, if they told them ‘jump’ they’d say ‘how high?’ and that’s what deterred me. It wasn’t even about the heat or anything like that. It was the treatment you received out there – the disrespect.”

Workers continue to migrate here. But along the skyline, a handful of brand new schools have popped up in the last decade. The U.S.-born children of immigrants are being educated for life beyond the fields; two very different generations sitting side by side in one city — which makes it the perfect place to measure their prospects for success.

It was back in 1971 that the three oldest Rodarte children traveled with their mother from Zacatecas in Central Mexico to the U.S. border. With the help of a family friend, they crossed in a taxi, and were unquestioned by the border patrol. Their mother was 5 months pregnant.

The younger sister, Marisol, says she’s proud to have been what some call an “anchor baby”: A child of illegal immigrants who becomes a U.S. citizen by birth.

Marisol: “I crossed the border. And in I crossed the border in my mother’s womb only to be born in the United States four months later, to become the anchor child that then facilitated the immigration process for the whole family.”

Marisol and her six siblings were the first generation of Rodartes to be American citizens. They had new opportunities, and were determined to break away from the traditional cycle that had trapped their parents in poverty and grueling labor.  Now, they’re all in professional careers.

Leticia: “I guess the idea of having a better life than my parents, not having to go work in the fields at 100 degree temperature, getting up as early as 3:30 in the morning, because I also did that during my summer vacation, being exhausted but at the same time hungry, to come home and have to start dinner, and all of that just made you think twice about education and being a better person and having a better future. That was very important to me.”

Delta: “I remember going to school because my parents said ‘you go to school and you learn because we didn’t get that opportunity.’ I remember my dad trying to talk to us in English even though he didn’t know English but I didn’t know better so we thought that was good. They had no clue as far as guidance. We just kinda knew that we had to go to school.”

Growing up in poverty, with their parents working long, hard hours, the odds seemed stacked against the Rodarte children. But sometimes struggle is the strongest catalyst for determination. In fact, the dynamic of the farm working culture itself seems to be motivating the children of immigrants to scale the social ladder. In the Delano Unified High School District, drop-out rates are less than half the state average. Academic scores are increasing, which might seem strange considering the dominance of the agricultural industry — notorious for its low wages and unstable working conditions. Unemployment levels here are twice the California average. Half of the families live in poverty, many in shanty villages or labor camps.

However, a supportive community can potentially offset the detrimental effects of poverty, according to Ricardo Stanton-Salazar, a professor at USC’s Rossier School of Education.

Ricardo: “People tend to settle to areas where they are going to be able to find people they identify with, share some common background features and begin to build a support system so that you can have community. And so as soon as you come as an immigrant, one of the first things you try to do is build a support group with people you feel some identification with.”

With ongoing immigration and high birth rates, Delano is almost 80 percent Latino. The community is immersed in a bilingual Mexican culture, which can also provide an advantage to its youth.

Ricardo: “If children are able to maintain their parents’ native language, and they maintain the language to a high level, it’s not only that they maintain the language, they maintain the traditional values that are attached to the language. So that acts as a buffer to assimilating the darker side of working class culture.”

The physical isolation of the city, coupled with an emphasis on education and family values, is creating an incubator for ambition. For the children of immigrants in Delano hoping to succeed, leaving the city to pursue higher education and professional careers is imperative.

Omar Viramontes is a sophomore and doing very well in school. His days are often 12 hours long, including a dawn commute from on the nearby hamlet of Earlimart. His parents earn a family income of just $20,000. Yet omar is planning to apply to Harvard and MIT for college.

Omar: “My parents came from Mexico. Right now they are working in the fields. They pick grapes. And they have been working there for about 20 years. So, it’s pretty darn… it’s a very difficult job. The only inspiration that I actually get is by seeing them every day coming home and they’re tired, they’re exhausted and I tell myself, you know, I have to be better. They didn’t have the opportunity to go to school here and you know what? They’re giving me the opportunity. And I’m a fool if I don’t take it.”

Omar is a member of the Math Club, the Chess Club, the Mathematics, Engineering, Science and Achievement club, and the California Scholarship Federation. After summer, he’ll also take his place as school president.

Omar: “I’m finishing high school in 3 years, so I can go to college early and have an advantage in life to help our my family, when I start my own family as well, and the community. I think the key to succeed is sacrificing yourself for the benefit of others.”

The sacrifices continue, in Delano and across California. By 2030, half of the state’s population will be immigrants and their children.

For the parents of the Rodarte family, it took a lifetime to earn their small share of the American dream. They’re now in their own comfortable, middle class home in one of the better neighborhoods in Delano.

Marisol talking in Spanish to her mother:  “Was it worth the struggle?”
Raquel Rodarte (in Spanish): “It was a lot of work in a job that was so hard. The work wasn’t as tough as the time and the temperature. But thank God, because now we have the house. So it was worth it. The sacrifice was worth it.”

The rodartes share a bowl of watermelon, papaya and grapes — fresh from the day’s harvest — and reminisce about their family’s history. Meanwhile, recent immigrants are heading home after another 12-hour shift among the grape vines.