Lizette Ortega, a graduate of the University of Arizona, Cochise College, and Douglas High School, will begin a new phase of her education this fall when she enrolls as a graduate student at the University of Iowa.

Lizette Ortega, former student of Cochise College, Douglas High School.

Ortega graduated from Douglas High in 2003 and Cochise College in 2005. She spent the last two years finishing up her bachelor’s degree in mathematics. She is receiving the Dean’s Graduate Fellowship to continue her studies in biostatistics in Iowa. Although she applied to seven graduate schools in Arizona, California, Texas, Colorado, and Iowa, she selected the University of Iowa program for its quality. The school covered the cost of her initial visit, and the fellowship will pay for her tuition and provide a stipend for living expenses.

“I’m scared and excited to be doing something new,” Ortega said. “But the summer programs I participated in showed me what graduate school is like. Seeing other students motivated me to want to do what they’re doing.”

At the urging of a University of Arizona advisor, Ortega took part in research experiences for undergraduates at Rice University in Houston and at Cal Poly Pomona in California. In 2006, she spent 10 weeks at Rice working with a group of students on research and statistics. Students presented their work at the end of the program. Ortega also got the chance to travel to a conference in El Salvador and to observe the work of other students at the national conference of the Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS).

 She attended the SACNAS conference a year later as a presenter of Cops and Stops: Racial Profiling and a Statistical Analysis of Los Angeles Police Department Traffic Stops and Searches. She worked on the project with a faculty member at the Applied Mathematical Science Summer Institute led by Cal Poly Pomona and Loyola Marymount University.

 “I really started liking math in middle school when I learned algebra,” Ortega said.

At Cochise College, she was part of a group of students who published an academic article in the international science journal Physics Education. It was her experience at Cochise College, her mother said, that helped Lizette focus on what she would do with her life.

 “When she came here,” said Rosa Ortega, a Student Services employee at the college, “the change in her was amazing. She started working and being really absorbed in school. And those internships opened her eyes to see that anybody can become anything they want to become.”

Ortega said her parents, Frank and Rosa, always encouraged her to keep trying and to go to school. Her brother, Adrian, 18, is a recent graduate of the New Mexico Military Institute and is home this summer taking Cochise College classes.

Although being so far apart will be a challenge for the entire family, the Ortegas are extremely proud of their children’s accomplishments.

“Today, Lizette is just two hour’s drive from home,” Rosa said. “She will be moving 1,600 miles away, and it is not going to be easy for us to go see her. But she is acquiring the tools she needs to succeed in this competitive world, and we are very proud of her achievements.”