Reconnecting with Grace Oreste
We have had the privilege of catching up with a prior SAVE student, Grace Oreste.
Grace attended All Saints Catholic School and participated in SAVE from 5th to 8th grade. She told us how she enjoyed going to the University of Nebraska at Omaha’s campus and working with the college volunteers while she was participating in SAVE. While at All Saints she participated in volleyball and soccer. She started showing interest in computers at an early age and built her first PC at 8 years old with the help of her dad.
After graduating from the SAVE Program and 8th grade, Grace went to Central High School. During her junior year at Central High School, she started an Afro Dance Club. After high school graduation, Grace was accepted into the University of Nebraska at Omaha as a Goodrich scholar.
Grace is continuing her love for computers and is majoring in electrical engineering and hopes to add a second major of computer engineering as well. On top of her heavy school load, Grace is a member of multiple campus organizations and clubs. She is a member of the African Student Association, Global Friends, IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), Friends of Japan club, and the Allies for Sign Language club. On top of all of those clubs she continued her passion for Afro Dance and founded the Afro Dance Club at UNO. As the founder and the president of the Afro Dance club, her duties include creating and teaching choreography to the club members, as well as setting up events for the club to perform at. The club now has 70 members that she oversees.
If you thought her schedule couldn’t be any busier , Grace also has a paid internship at Union Pacific. Here she works in the IT department building and coding computers to be sent out to companies all over the world!
After she obtains her two bachelor’s degrees in engineering, she hopes to attend Grad school and get her masters degree in computer science at UNO.
After catching up with Grace we knew we had to have her on our team! Grace is a great example for our kids of what is possible! She found what interested her and is now thriving at UNO, the campus where she went for SAVE! We hired Grace and she is helping us with our current AMP sessions! She has been wonderful with the kids and they absolutely love her. Grace commented on how different the AMP sessions are now from when she was participating in SAVE, “We used to just go to UNO and have homework help, but now the kids are able to engage in really fun activities. I see a difference in the kids’ attitudes towards AMP days, they love coming to SAVE!”
We were so happy to reconnect with Grace and now have her on our team!
