Numbers kept senior Alekxander Valdez company, as he worked through his math sheet at the table. It was 1 a.m. but he refused to let his parents down. 

Every day, Alekxander watched them shuffle in the house from their taqueria shift, exhausted. They did it for him, and to Alekxander, grades were the only way he could repay.

So, he remained at the table until the problem clicked – even if he had to do it alone.

“I have this deep mentality where like, the son, or the child, for sure has to exceed over their parents from what they have done in their life,” Alekxander said.

Indebted

Alekxander’s parents moved to the U.S. and met in the early 2000s. Alekxander was an interesting child growing up, according to his dad Edwin Valdez. When Valdez would bring home toys, Alekxander would set them aside for puzzles.

“I’m talking maybe even less than a year old,” Valdez said, “he seemed very interested in doing (puzzles and Legos) instead of playing with guns or cars. I compared it to when I was his age growing up, and it surprised me.” 

Alekxander’s parents run local gas station taqueiras to sustain his grandma, younger sister and Alekxander that share a home. Alekxander’s parents, both lacking a high school diploma, especially fostered his problem-solving passion. 

“They always work hard,” Alekxander said. “Whenever I try to do stuff to do after school stuff, I don’t want to be disrupting anything, you know, disrupting work or anything. But my dad always, always was like, ‘Hey, stay after school, (I’ll take you.)’”

Alekxander funneled his parent’s support into academics. While his family only loosely monitored his grades, Alekxander obsessed over them.

“I want to do good, you know?” Alekxander said. “I want to go to college. (My parents) always tell me, ‘Hey, at least get a degree. It doesn’t matter what you do, but get an education for us.’”

Isolated

By intermediate school, Alekxander stood out academically. Other students began asking him for help before the teacher. Then, the COVID-19 pandemic isolated him in seventh grade.

“I really didn’t have anybody,” Alekxander said. “I’m the oldest child. I really reached a certain age where my parents couldn’t help me anymore. So I had to do things by myself, like homework. It got to a point where I was like, ‘I got to do this.’”

According to Valdez, he was never able to help Alekxander with homework, but looked to support him in other ways.

“On the contrary,” Valdez said. “As he became a young adult, I had to ask him to help me with certain things. It was all his doing, I just kind of was there for emotional support to tell him, ‘Hey, you can do anything you want.’” 

Alekxander’s personal drive followed as he returned to school. Interacting with teachers one-on-one accelerated his learning, but he lacked interaction with other students.

“I’ll say in a certain way, (I felt lonely),” Alekxander said. “I kind of also wanted another person that also understands how I think – to have like another person that also understands it, and not everyone just asking me.”

High school offered a different environment though. Enrolling in as many as he could, AP classes offered rooms for connection. There, Alekxander made his closest friends.

“To have like another person that also understands it, and not everyone just asking me, you can also ask another person,” Alekxander said. “It’s good to like to converse, to understand and work together to solve the problem at hand.”

Growing

Alekxander advanced through high school, as his little sister did through intermediate. When her math classes grew more complex, Alekxander offered his support, following his dad’s advice.

“I always tell him to lend a hand,” Valdez said. “Help the people you can help, who are struggling. If you see somebody struggling and you can help them, do it from the goodness of your heart.”

Tutoring his little sister, a second passion struck.

“It leaves me satisfied to help people,” Alekxander said. “Knowing that I also know I may be good at it, but I know that everyone else isn’t as good as I am. I want them to like to understand. I kind of feel I would say I feel a satisfaction (when I can help.)”

Mixed with his newfound passion to educate, math became more than an A on a report card after he took AP Calculus-BC. By unit 4, Alekxander said knew math would be his future.

“It tied into real life stuff, like the rate of change,” Alekxander said. “And now I go out and coincidentally, I look at something. ‘I’m like, oh crap. I can see some calculus in that or some physics.’ It opened my mind (to how I could use it in the world.)”

Senior Jason Montes took both Calculus courses and said Alekxander’s talent shocked him, especially when Calculus teacher Heidi Kloes let Alekxander teach the class.

“He taught it well, he knew what he was talking about,” Montes said. “I would argue, like, he’s probably one of the smartest people in that class – one of the smartest people I know.”

Montes met Alekxander in eighth grade and said that Alekxander’s drive to support others inspires him.

“Every time we have a weird problem that we don’t know how to do, we always just ask Alex because he probably knows the answer,” Montes said. “I don’t know something about him, it rubs off on you. You know, he makes you want to be a better person.”

Alekxander became the first in his family to earn a diploma this year, accomplishing his childhood goal. Valdez said watching Alekxander walk the stage felt fulfilling.

“I watched him study late nights to one in the morning, and sometimes, two in the morning,” Valdez said. “It was good to see his sacrifice pay off, because he’s the one that did the hard part.”

While his initial drive to surpass his parents faded, he left the stage with a new goal: To use his knowledge to help others. Alekxander will now major in chemical engineering at the University of Houston, where he hopes to make an innovative impact.

“If you’re good at something, really focus on it,” Alekxander said. “Optimize around it, and if you have a chance to help people using that skill, for sure go do it. I feel like helping people around you – society and all that – It really will help us better ourselves in the way that we can learn from each other and gain more knowledge.”