From ‘too much’ to just right: How one student found a home at Berkeley

Growing up in Sonoma, California, Victoria Hernandez Padilla always felt like she was too much. Too curious, too loud, too bold. She was always asking questions. As a toddler before she’d learned English, she’d spend hours arranging bright magnetic letters on the fridge, asking her mom again and again if it spelled a word. 

In school, her classmates would whisper about her, saying she talked too much. She felt she couldn’t ask questions, otherwise she’d be cast into the “loud Latina” stereotype. But Victoria wanted answers and would push until she got them. 

“I never felt that I was truly accepted in my hometown,” she says. 

Sonoma Valley has at least 100 wineries with vineyards stretching across 14,000 acres of land. Socioeconomically, the region is divided: Wealthier residents, including some vineyard owners, tend to live in higher‑income areas, while many service workers and farmworkers live in more affordable, working‑class neighborhoods. Victoria lived with her family in one of those working‑class areas.

Victoria’s parents met in Jalisco, Mexico, and later immigrated to Sonoma, California. As parents, they rarely had the time to give her the support she needed. They worked long hours in restaurants and other service jobs, and although they did the best they could, Victoria felt isolated. She and her twin sister and younger brother were mostly left to support themselves and their future plans.

But she did have the support of her community. 

“Looking back, I jokingly call it ‘A community project: getting Vicky into a good school,'” she laughs.

People could see that Victoria wanted to succeed, that she had a curiosity bubbling up that she couldn’t contain, even if she tried. She wanted to know why, exactly, the community was divided, why the worker side — her side — of Sonoma was disproportionately Latino and low-income. And she wanted to change it. During high school, she fundraised and volunteered for a local nonprofit that helps students in her community get the education they deserve. 

Teachers, counselors, volunteer tutors — they all saw her spark, her desire to learn. They gave her rides to the SATs, helped her apply to college, and accompanied her to participate in the UC Berkeley Regents’ Overnight Host Program.

Now a second-year student at Berkeley, Victoria is majoring in political economy and sociology. She’s passionate about addressing systematic inequalities that her family and community face, like disproportionate academic advantages, and is learning how to take meaningful action.

She’s also a Regents’ and Chancellor’s Scholar, one of a handful of students chosen for Berkeley’s most prestigious scholarship awarded to undergraduates. The scholarship connects recipients to a campus network of students and faculty who support their professional development. As a coordinator of the Regents’ overnight program, she shows low-income high school students what Berkeley has to offer and connects them to campus resources and a community “that believes in their academic potential,” she says. 

At Berkeley, Victoria feels supported and challenged in a way she hasn’t before.

“Berkeley not only embraces my curiosity, but it pushes me to be even louder with my questions,” she says. “There’s something beautiful about the campus that allows students to engage with different people from different cultures and backgrounds. Everybody has a story.

“Being at Berkeley makes me believe that I can truly be someone, and grow into the person I want to be.”