Dear Montecito: Kristine Carrillo 

Who doesn’t love a full circle moment? Today we have yet another wonderful featuree who is an alumna of the Mission Scholars program. Inspired by her time in the program and her upbringing here in Santa Barbara, Kristine Carrillo is a current senior at Brown University where she studies International and Public Affairs and Education Studies and is developing big plans to improve our education system. 

Q. How did you get involved with Mission Scholars?

A. I got involved with Mission Scholars in my junior year, and they’ve really helped me with everything from academics to college life and starting my professional career. They have been very much like a second family to me. I am constantly keeping in contact with them, even now being out of state, and I still feel like they’re very close to me which I appreciate. 

Do you remember the college application process well?

Yes – my college application period started right when COVID hit so a lot of the workshops for my cohort at Mission Scholars were held over Zoom. Despite that, I feel that they were able to maintain a strong sense of community, and I got to meet a lot of other students from other schools around Santa Barbara which I really liked because I was able to make new friends that I otherwise wouldn’t, especially since it was during a time when it was very hard to stay connected. I always felt as though I had both my peers and the staff to turn to for college advice, or if I was struggling in other areas – they were always there to help me. 

What was it like getting your acceptance letter from Brown?

I opened it right after my Zoom Econ class. I knew that it was waiting for me, but I didn’t want to open it during class – especially since I wasn’t expecting much. I was in complete shock. I never even considered applying to out-of-state schools before joining Mission Scholars. So yeah, it was a complete shock. I hadn’t even told my parents I had applied there. I was very happy to explain it to them once I had gotten my letter.

You didn’t think you would be accepted?

I was always looking up the acceptance rates and going on YouTube to see other students’ college stats. I really didn’t think it was going to work out for me. But Mission Scholars really encouraged me to apply to whatever school I wanted to attend and not to be deterred from what I saw online.

What made you want to go to Brown?

I have been interested for a long time in pursuing a career in education policy and research. Brown offered a paired major in Educational Studies and International and Public Affairs that I was really interested in, especially since educational policy isn’t always taught until graduate level, but I knew I wanted to right away start learning about it and engaging in it professionally. 

When do you remember first being interested in education policy?

I guess the seed grew for me when I first entered education. My dad used to be a custodian at the local private school where my three older siblings attended on scholarship. But once I was of age to go to school, my dad was laid off and the scholarships went away. Since I was too young, I couldn’t really understand why I didn’t get to attend the school my sisters had. But as I got older, I realized how heavily your socioeconomic status influences the education that you receive. 

When I was at San Marcos, I was a part of the AAPLE Academy, which is a leadership program. When college is discussed in that program, it was about how you can attend elite colleges, but not so much how you can get into a college – because a lot of the students have parents who went to college or they have access to college counselors. I think I started to see the division between AAPLE Academy participants and the rest of the school. We had our own counselor, we had priority choosing classes, and despite the majority of the school being Latino, this program was majority white, affluent students. AAPLE Academy students were receiving a lot of extra support that the rest of the school didn’t have. 

And when did you officially decide you wanted to study in this area?

After my first few days in the AAPLE Program, I was explaining my experiences to my older siblings. My sister talked a lot about how these sorts of divides pertain to policy and lots of other factors, such as socioeconomic status. She is the one who told me that I could study these issues and have a career in this. If wasn’t for my sister – if it wasn’t for the conversations I had with her – I wouldn’t have been able to see all this information cohesively. She played a big part in setting me up to do what I do now; even at college I still find myself incredibly passionate about these issues in education, and have a lot of drive to center my academic and professional experience around this. 

With only one semester to go, what has been your favorite class?

Applied Statistics for Education Research. Before this class I did not feel confident in myself and my ability to build a quantitative background or pursue research. I was very scared of coding; it was never something I did in high school. My professor, Dr. Pierre De Galbert, put a lot of time into supporting students who were new to coding, and that has made me confident pursuing in it professional spaces. I have had a few research experiences following that class, but I definitely would not have pursued them if it was not for that class.

Are you leaning toward a career in research?

I think I am leaning more toward a career in policy, but I think in order to be effective working in policy, you need to be able to understand the research. 

Finally, with what part of education policy would you most like to be involved? 

Because of my experience in Mission Scholars, I have been very interested in college access and the college success space. There is a lot of emphasis on getting first generation students into college but not so much support seeing them complete college. If I could make a change, I would want to extend the support to students who are already in college to make sure matriculation
stays up.