Paloma Collazo-Vargas is from strawberry-town, Watsonville, CA. Her parents immigrated from Mexico, but met here, in hopes of a better life—as the oldest of the family; she is the first for graduating high school and recently, graduated from Earlham College, IN, as a McNair Scholar. Paloma majored in International Studies with a concentration of Latin America in hopes of working in diplomacy.

At her time in Earlham, Paloma practically did everything such as learning an instrument and new languages, participating in multiple clubs, performed in plays, published art and poetry, and danced (she did not want to graduate with any regrets!). However, the biggest takeaway from her time at Earlham was learning to be independent and finding herself. Paloma learned to do things for herself from merely learning to cook or sew, but also more significant things like beginning to re-evaluate her identity as a queer woman of color. In her four years, she learned to be more spiritual, differentiating religion and spirituality, and to seek out mindfulness and practice self-love. Paloma is excited to work with Nationalities Service Center and make a difference with the community that she is familiar with all to well.