Cristian's Journey of Resilience and Success at SDSU

There are days Cristian Rosete wakes up in his apartment in San Diego State University’s Viva sophomore housing complex, and he can’t help but tear up.

Finally, he has a home. 

For the past five years, “home” for Rosete was a bed in a friend’s house, sharing space with 13 other people in a three-bedroom house or the back seat of his car. 

Rosete, a transfer computer science major, was able to overcome homelessness to earn a scholarship through SDSU’s Guardian Scholars program, which supports students who identify as current or former foster youth, wards of the court or homeless during their time at the university.

Rosete remembers the moment he realized that, for the first time in a long time, he wouldn’t have to worry about where he would sleep at night. It was June at First Contact, a mandatory orientation program for newly admitted students in the Office of Educational Opportunity Programs, Outreach and Success. 

“I remembered they kind of glossed over that we’d be getting housing and I was like, ‘You’re kidding,’” he said. “When you are transient and you have to worry about where you have to live, it sucks. People who don’t have to pay those bills don’t feel how heavy of a burden it is; it feels like you’re suffocating sometimes.

“But now, it’s like we finally get to breathe,” Rosete said. 

That deep breath came after a tumultuous stretch in Rosete’s life that saw him leave his parents’ home before he graduated high school in 2018. Over the next year, he dropped out of Oxnard College after a month and started working at Pacific Sunwear to make ends meet, all the while not having a permanent home.

Rosete said he started to take stock of his life during the COVID-19 pandemic and, after some “serious soul searching,” he decided to give school another try, re-enrolling at Oxnard College in spring 2021. 

He quickly developed a support network there, including Marcella Klein Williams, director of the college’s STEM Center, who convinced him to become a tutor, a decision Rosete said changed the trajectory of his college experience. 

“I don’t know how I would have gotten through junior college without that program,” Rosete said. 

Rosete thrived at Oxnard College, becoming vice president of Associated Student Government and president of an on-campus club, all while becoming an integral member of the STEM Center. 

Klein Williams said Rosete’s resilience was inspiring to watch firsthand. 

“The first thing I always want to say is that Cristian is an amazing and special young man,” she said. “He’s an example of resilience in action. Any situation that would come in his direction, he would say ‘What can I learn from it?’

“I’ve been in education for over 30 years, and you know when you meet brilliance,” Williams said. “I know we are all going to know his name.” 

But in the spring of 2023, on the cusp of graduating and narrowing his school choice, Rosete was hit with a hard reality check — a visiting college counselor told him that he was short of two advanced physics courses necessary to be accepted to a four-year university. 

Normally, these classes would have to be taken in different semesters, but Rosete got the OK from the physics department to take them simultaneously, along with calculus, linear algebra and differential equations — a 23-unit course load. All, of course, while not knowing where he’d sleep at night.  

“The professor told me that he wasn’t going to tell me no, but that it would be really hard,” Rosete said. “I told myself, ‘Get up, get it down, get it done. There’s a bigger goal at the end. You’re suffering now, but if it was easy, everyone would do it.’”

There were moments when Rosete said he almost broke — midterm time came immediately to his mind. But he couldn’t give up, he said. During those times, he’d go to his favorite place to find relief: the beach. 

“Marcella would always tell me to schedule fun and, for me, fun was going to the beach, reading a chapter from a book,” he said. “In those moments, I’d get really introspective, and I would be reminded that life is like the water. You’ll have really high peaks, and in the blink of an eye you’re going to crash and you don’t know why, but you have to get back up and rise like the waves.”

Like the waves, Rosete rose to the occasion, passing the spring semester with a 3.5 grade-point average, which actually lowered his overall GPA, but it meant that he’d be able to move on from community college.

He arrived at SDSU in the fall, but not before taking a sabbatical to Mexico after graduating from Oxnard College. There, he volunteered as a translator and math tutor and did a lot of self-discovery. 

“I was able to forgive the past versions of myself and, in that moment, there was a sense of bliss and catharsis,” Rosete said. 

Feeling at home involves more than a safe physical location, and Rosete chose SDSU over University of California, Irvine; California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo; and University of California San Diego; in part because of the people he met on his June visit. They reminded him of his support network at Oxnard College.

“When I went to First Contact, I met EOPOS Assistant Director Bryan [Spencer], Guardian Scholars Assistant Coordinator Marie [Branes] and everyone at Guardian Scholars, and I felt that same energy Marcella gave me the day I met her,” Rosete said. “I knew this was where I wanted to be.”

Branes called Rosete a “shining” student whose positive attitude is infectious.

“He has a gift of connecting with people; he’s warm, amazing, motivated and driven despite what life has thrown his way,” she said. “I feel like he’s an example of the power of Guardian Scholars to help remove many of the barriers that the students face, which allows them to reach their full potential and obtain their degree sooner and more smoothly.”

Rosete has settled into life at SDSU, quickly making friends and a support network. Living on campus has allowed him to become immersed in the campus culture and make friends from all different backgrounds and majors. 

“Having a home so close to school allows me to focus on my studies with no excuses,” Rosete said. “If I can pass 23 units without a place to live, there’s no reason that I can’t ace the four classes that I am taking.”

But Rosete said he has no regrets about the path he took to get here. 

“There have been a lot of tears and sacrifices, but I think I can ultimately say that it’s built my character,” he said. “When I graduate from here, I know I will be a better version of myself, and I can’t wait for what the future holds for me.”