Angel Reyes’s life took an unexpected turn one day in his honors biotechnology class during his senior year. A guest speaker came in to tell the story of his path in science—from the son of Mexican migrant farm workers to working as an associate scientist at a large biotech company.
“He came into our class, which had many Hispanic students like me, and said ‘I grew up just like you guys. Both my parents were from Mexico, and I did not think of myself being a scientist later in life,’” Reyes recalls. “And I also felt that way, too: None of my family members have ever stepped foot in a lab before. My dad does construction and my mom works at a fish factory. And it wasn’t until I met this speaker that I saw I could do so much in life. And I thought ‘I can see myself being like him in 15 years.’”
That guest speaker was Raul Lazaro, now an associate scientist at Amgen, who had volunteered to speak to students in Jocelyn White’s class at Pacifica High School in Oxnard, CA, outside of Los Angeles. He is a regular speaker at local schools as part of the ABE Volunteer Program, through which White has connected with Amgen guest speakers numerous times as part of her bioscience classes.
Fast forward 2 years from that moment in White’s class to now, and Reyes is a sophomore at Moorpark College studying biotech manufacturing. He credits his interactions with Lazaro, the ABE labs, and especially his two high school teachers—White and her colleague Chloe Carson—as shaping his current ambitions to work in biotechnology.
“From the minute he heard about the biotech class, Angel became my biggest cheerleader,” says White, whose biotechnology class for juniors and seniors runs through the full ABE Foundations of Biotech lab series. “It was so amazing because he’s a very outgoing guy—very friendly and outspoken and confident—and so he jazzed it up for a lot of his friends, and in class, always was very excited about everything we were doing.”
Reyes’s gateway into the class was a class of Carson’s in the school’s Health Science Academy. Carson remembers that Reyes enrolled in both the health academy and the coding academy, and it was unusual for students to be in two at once. “He was just one of those kids who wanted to do more all the time, which you don’t come across every day,” Carson said.
In Carson’s classes, she works to expose students to the idea of biotechnology to prime their potential interests in taking more advanced classes in that area, like White’s biotechnology class. Carson runs the ABE Foundations of Biotech introductory labs (pipetting and gel electrophoresis) and the ABE kitten paternity test in her classes, in which students run a gel to determine which cat is most likely to be the father of a group of kittens. “Just having a basic understanding of how to use a micropipette and how running a gel works is important for showing them the types of skills they might use in college biology classes,” she says.
Carson then encourages those who enjoyed the labs to consider White’s biotech class, as well as other science offerings. It’s a system that has resulted in many Pacifica students following a bio-focused path. And importantly, both Carson and White, who have been working with ABE Greater Los Angeles for more than 15 years, invite guest speakers, like Lazaro, to speak to their classes while offering other resources for their students to learn about career pathways in science, medicine, and biotechnology, in particular.
“I think it really opens their eyes, as many students come in thinking that being a nurse or doctor is all there is within the health field,” White says. “But then a lot of students will say to me afterwards, ‘Oh, I didn’t realize there are all these other things you can do with this knowledge, and maybe I don't want to work with patients directly, but I want to make an impact, and I want to do something good for human health. So, I can work in the lab side of things.’”
Those types of connections led Reyes to learn about the biotechnology manufacturing program at Moorpark College. Right off the bat, in his freshman year, Reyes got an internship at Capsida Therapeutics. He immediately was able to use the lab skills he learned through the ABE labs with Carson and White. And there, he “really fell in love with biotech,” he says. “When my boss was telling me about all the drugs they are working on, like, for example, for Parkinson's disease, I thought that if I can even put my two cents in, that would be amazing. I just want to be there to help somebody out.”
As Reyes continues his biotech pursuits, he is on track to complete his bachelor’s degree in 2 years and is eyeing a master’s program at California State University Channel Islands. In addition to his course load, he is working multiple jobs and playing various leadership roles, including serving as a chemistry tutor. Between it all, he still checks in with White, who shares all his successes with Carson and the team at Pacifica.
Reyes’ goal is to continue to expose himself to as many things as possible, to take advantage of the opportunities he has, which his parents did not. “I don't want to let my parents down,” he says. “My parents sacrificed so much to be here. So that’s why I push myself so insanely hard. I want to be out there living my best life."