{"id":16669,"date":"2021-06-08T13:42:09","date_gmt":"2021-06-08T17:42:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/?p=16669"},"modified":"2022-01-12T12:06:56","modified_gmt":"2022-01-12T17:06:56","slug":"great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/2021\/06\/great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college\/","title":{"rendered":"Great Oaks Village Resident Makes History, Earns AA Degree from Valencia College"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Statistics show that 50 percent of foster kids graduate from high school, but only 10 percent apply to college. Even more discouraging, less than 3 percent of the foster kids who go to college wind up completing their degree. Not good odds, but not a problem for Hartley Villagra, 19, who recently became the first resident in the 97-year history of Great Oaks Village to earn an Associate in Arts or an AA degree.<\/p>\n<p>Villagra was sent into foster care four years ago at age 15. After two years of being housed in different group homes and attending various high schools throughout the state, she wound up at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.countyoffice.org\/great-oaks-village-youth-family-services-division-orlando-fl-6b5\/\">Great Oaks Village<\/a>, an Orange County residential foster group home for children ages 6 to 18+ who have been removed from their homes by the State of Florida due to abuse, neglect or abandonment.<\/p>\n<p>These moves typically set foster-care students back at least a year in their education with every change, but Hartley refused to fall behind. While at Great Oaks Village, Villagra graduated from Winter Park High School and transitioned over to <a href=\"https:\/\/valenciacollege.edu\/\">Valencia College<\/a>, earning an AA degree and graduating with honors. She will be transitioning to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/\">UCF<\/a> in the fall to start on a bachelor\u2019s degree with a major in Criminal Justice.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn foster care, the prevailing attitude is you <em>maybe<\/em> graduate from high school and get a minimum wage job, so you don\u2019t worry about college,\u201d explained Villagra. \u201cThis just motivated me more because I\u2019m pretty hard-headed; I wasn\u2019t going to let limited thinking deflate my dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Understandably, foster group homes are focused on healing past traumas and getting young adults through high school. Villagra was fortunate that her <a href=\"https:\/\/foundationforfosterchildren.org\/\">Foundation for Foster Children<\/a> youth advocate encouraged her not to give up on her college dream. \u201cHe told me I would go to college because I could do it, and he constantly reinforced that in me,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Villagra admitted maintaining a positive attitude in foster care can be difficult. \u201cI realized I was stronger than I thought I was and that the negativity other people were putting on me was something I could shed,\u201d she said. \u201cI had to make my own decisions about my education and create a positive outcome for myself.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For Villagra, who has now become an advocate for better educations and educational support for foster kids, getting a bachelor\u2019s degree is just another step on the way to obtaining a law degree from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.famu.edu\/\">Florida A&amp;M University<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI hope to transfer the knowledge I obtain from law school to help foster youth,\u201d she said. \u201cThey deserve to be told they\u2019re worthy because they\u2019ve already dealt with getting knocked down and feeling like they don\u2019t deserve to be happy. We have to deal with the trauma associated with that, but we also have to look to the future and have confidence we can accomplish anything we set our minds to.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>To find out more about Great Oaks Village, contact Dr. Tracy Salem at <a href=\"mailto:tracy.salem@ocfl.net\">tracy.salem@ocfl.net<\/a> or call 407-836-7682.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Statistics show that 50 percent of foster kids graduate from high school, but only 10 percent apply to college. Even more discouraging, less than 3 percent of the foster kids who go to college wind up completing their degree. Not good odds, but not a problem for Hartley Villagra, 19, who recently became the first [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":16670,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[629,323,158,172],"class_list":["post-16669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-services","tag-foundation-for-foster-children","tag-great-oaks-village","tag-ucf","tag-valencia-college"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Great Oaks Village Resident Makes History, Earns AA Degree from Valencia College<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/2021\/06\/great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Great Oaks Village Resident Makes History, Earns AA Degree from Valencia College\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Statistics show that 50 percent of foster kids graduate from high school, but only 10 percent apply to college. Even more discouraging, less than 3 percent of the foster kids who go to college wind up completing their degree. Not good odds, but not a problem for Hartley Villagra, 19, who recently became the first [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/2021\/06\/great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"OCFL Newsroom\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/OrangeCountyFlorida\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-06-08T17:42:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-01-12T17:06:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/Hartley-Villagra.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"509\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sydney Tran\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@OrangeCoFL\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@OrangeCoFL\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sydney Tran\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/2021\/06\/great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/2021\/06\/great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Sydney Tran\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/#\/schema\/person\/4f533c2fbcad3a19bf733c75a70e7e36\"},\"headline\":\"Great Oaks Village Resident Makes History, Earns AA Degree from Valencia College\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-06-08T17:42:09+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-01-12T17:06:56+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/2021\/06\/great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college\/\"},\"wordCount\":519,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/2021\/06\/great-oaks-village-resident-makes-history-earns-aa-degree-from-valencia-college\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/newsroom.ocfl.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/Hartley-Villagra.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Foundation for Foster Children\",\"Great Oaks Village\",\"UCF\",\"Valencia College\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Community &amp; 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