Jordan-Matthews senior Jacquelinne Marroquin Tobar created the school’s first Water Bottle Recycling Program in 9th grade — and all while she was still learning to speak English.
It’s been good practice for her ultimate dream: working with the United Nations to pursue humanitarian projects all over the world.
“Anything I am doing is towards that goal, thinking about that goal,” Marroquin Tobar said. “I feel like the United Nations is such a great organization that is doing so much for so many people for so many different countries, and I would love to do that.”
Born in Houston, Marroquin Tobar grew up speaking Spanish and attending school in Guatemala City, Guatemala’s capital. She and her family moved to Siler City nearly four years ago, when she was 14, joining relatives who’d already moved there.
They returned to the U.S. for a variety of reasons. Economically, she said Guatemala wasn’t doing well, and many businesses suffered, including her parents’ business. Violence began to escalate around the country, too.
“It wasn’t safe anymore,” she said.
Providing Marroquin Tobar with a better education and opportunities also factored into her parents’ decision.
“Education in Guatemala, Mexico, any Central American country — it’s not the best,” she said.
After they arrived in January 2016, Marroquin Tobar enrolled in Jordan-Matthews as a 9th grader in the middle of the school year. It was a difficult adjustment at first, she said, especially since she knew so little English.
“I had some vocabulary and everything, but I couldn’t speak,” she said. “I couldn’t have a conversation.”
Culture shock also threw her for a loop, and she had to start life anew in a strange place.
“It’s so much different from life in Guatemala,” Marroquin Tobar said, adding, “The school is different. The classes are different. The opportunities are just like water and oil — so different, nothing alike … Everything’s different, and it’s so hard to adjust when the only thing you have known for years has disappeared.”
At first, she didn’t want to interact with anyone for fear that she’d be mocked or looked down upon for any language mistakes, which made it hard to make new friends and connections. While going to the store with her parents, she even remembers hiding behind her parents or sneaking away whenever someone asked a question or spoke in English.
“Because my mom and my dad — they knew a little bit of English, and I thought they spoke better than me,” she said, then added with a laugh: “So I was like, ‘I’m going the other way,’ so they wouldn’t ask me to translate. I did it a lot of times.”
School also proved to be a struggle at first; later it became her lifeline. She had taken English back at her school in Guatemala and had some learned vocabulary. That’s why initially, she thought she could manage.
“And I was like, ‘I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine,’” Marroquin Tobar said. “And then … they gave me civics and economics. They gave me biology, and I didn’t know English. And that was — oof — it was so hard, like so hard, because my English level was just not there at all.”
She’d tested into ESL I, the beginners’ class — something she later called “the best thing that could have happened to me.” While in her regular classes with native speakers, she said she initially maintained a low profile and spoke only when she was sure of her answers, though she wanted to participate more. The thought of group projects terrified her.
“Nobody wanted to be with me in a project,” she said. “They were like: ‘What is she gonna do? Like, she can’t do any research. She can’t talk. What is she going to do?’”
But she rose to the challenge, putting to use what her former ESL teacher, Wendi Pillars, called her “beautiful gift of perseverance.”
“Her progress in learning English was beautiful,” Pillars said. “She is driven by curiosity, and I just loved how she would ask questions when she didn’t understand, needed to clarify something, or simply wanted to know more. She was the type of student who would come in and share something she had discovered on a given topic over the weekend or when she was at home.”
Every day after school, Marroquin Tobar went home and studied for three or four consecutive hours, trying to memorize concepts, consult her “best friend,” her English-to-Spanish dictionary, and practice on the language app Duolingo.
Sometimes, she’d study overnight; other times she’d cry. Watching kids’ movies in English, like “Shrek,” and using the language at every opportunity also helped improve her language skills.
Finally, everything began to pay off: in 10th grade, after just two ESL classes, she tested out of the program and now even translates services for her church, Faith Family Ministries.
“The beginning of 10th grade, I felt more comfortable. I participated more in class,” she said. “And I was like, ‘I understand this.’ … When I could understand and just be part of conversations, I was like, ‘I’m free. I can talk.’”
But shaky English didn’t stop her from crusading against local pollution in Jordan-Matthews. In the middle of her 9th grade year, she started up Jordan-Matthews’ first Water Bottle Recycling Project, a campaign intended to teach students about the importance of recycling and change their habits.
The idea came to her during one of her ESL classes with Pillars, with whom she worked on the project. Pillars had been discussing water pollution and its environmental harm one day, and Marroquin Tobar said she “felt the need to do something even though (her) English was not good at a time.”
She presented the project to school faculty and staff, received approval and then dived right in.
“The fact that she was still learning English was — honestly — a moot point because someone with her passion, her intellect, and rationale for helping others was going to make it happen somehow,” Pillars said. “She was a little nervous before presenting to the staff, but I never doubted her. It’s crazy how powerful her presence has been in our school.”
Together, Marroquin Tobar and Pillars placed more than 60 cardboard boxes around the school and — before schools closed in March — they’d go around school every Friday, collecting all recycled bottles for about an hour. They’d then dump them into a large recycling bin, where a recycling company would pick them up and bring them back to their Raleigh facility.
Usually, they’d collect more than 1,000 bottles each week. Marroquin Tobar made videos in English about the project, too, to educate students about recycling and water pollution. Teachers from all over the school — and even outside Jordan-Matthews — began calling her and asking her to present to their classes, including ESL, AP Spanish and even computer science.
“They were like, ‘Hey, can you come and just talk to the guys, just talk to the students, and try to teach them why you’re doing what you’re doing?’” she said. “ … And I keep doing that, and I hope to keep doing it when we go back to school. It’s something that I really want to just be there and do it and try to pass on my project to any kind of club or someone who wants to take over because I have to go to college.”
Throughout the project’s duration — three and a half years — she said she’s seen many students change their habits and attitudes toward recycling, even though many at first “couldn’t understand what recycling was about.”
“We can do something,” she said. “I mean recycling more than 1,000 bottles in just one school every week is not doing a little thing. It’s like a big thing. It’s a big deal, and we’re doing it. We’re doing it here in Siler City. It’s amazing.”
She hopes to lead similar projects in whichever college she attends — and later throughout the world with the United Nations. For her drive and accomplishments, LatinxEd, a Chapel Hill-based education nonprofit, recognized her this year as one of its “20 Under 20” award recipients.
Per the organization’s website, the Latinx “20 Under 20” is the state’s only competition “focused on elevating the best and brightest Latinx students across (North Carolina).” Judges look for scholarship, community contributions and leadership in all nominees.
“Ultimately, 20 Under 20 Listmakers are leaders — young people who inspire and lead others,” the website read. “Most importantly, they stand for what they believe in. We (seek) Latinx students who have the courage to translate their dreams into action and energize their community.”
Marroquin Tobar was one of two students chosen from Siler City. David Gonzalez Hernandez, a J-M graduate and current UNC-G student, was the other.
“I feel like I was born to help, like, it’s not about me,” she said. “It’s not about what I want. But it’s more about: what do they want? What do they need? I feel like that’s the heart I have.”
She’s received so much help from others, including her family, her parents and her teachers, that she wants to return the favor. Working out of an embassy or working with countries and villages directly to meet needs — that’s what she said she wants to do.
And Pillars doesn’t doubt for a second that Marroquin Tobar will realize that dream.
“Jacquelinne is a phenomenal young woman,” Pillars said, adding: “She is someone who optimizes opportunities that come her way, and I believe she’s destined to do something that will ripple across the planet … She loves learning, helping and serving others and believes deeply in making the world we live in a better place.”
Reporter Victoria Johnson can be reached at victoria@chathamnr.com.