Rising Scholars Opening Doors for Themselves

By Luciana Chavez Special to Merced College

The Rising Scholars Program in the California Community Colleges (CCC) system exists to support people like recent Merced College graduates James Tribble, Maria Washington and Wendy Fong in their quest for academic success and in their quest for success in life.

Tribble and Washington, both formerly incarcerated, and Fong, currently incarcerated at the Central California Women’s Facility (CCWF) in Chowchilla, are Rising Scholars who are turning painful pasts into hope and opportunity.

At Merced College, they’re working hard to meet the growing need for both populations of students.

“Our numbers on campus are increasing,” Director of Rising Scholars Dondi Lawrence said. “Our numbers among currently incarcerated students are increasing.”

On the outside, Tribble has been studying while also mentoring other formerly incarcerated and justice-impacted Rising Scholars.

“I tell them, ‘We’re here to do a 180,’” Tribble said. “‘It didn’t work for us inside, so let’s try again on the outside.’

“The fact that anyone comes to me for advice seems crazy, though. No one taught me how to do college. I had to learn it on my own. My enjoyment comes from walking side by side with other students.”

It’s not an easy thing to learn. When Tribble first started at Merced College, he would ask counselor Monica Macias if someone would come to class with him, because he didn’t understand what professors were saying.

“They’d tell me, ‘James, you got this,” Tribble said. “‘If this is what you want, we have your back.’ That’s the first time I had someone fighting for me.”

His school fortunes changed three months in.

“I saw the results in my grades,” Tribble said. “My brain was reminding me, ‘You learned this. This is college. This is a real thing.’ I realized I deserved this experience and that I would make it.”

Others had to convince him because Tribble, now 29, had to raise himself, while also surviving cancer as a child, with parents who struggled with addiction.

He said he has been mentally and physically on his own since age 16. It contributed to him spending roughly three years total in county jail. He was also kicked out of high school and continuation school and dropped out of independent study.

“I wrestled with school my whole life,” said Tribble, who was in and out of jail before getting clean. “I had to learn a whole different lifestyle at Merced College. So getting this second opportunity to learn . . . wow.”

Tribble, who is now sober, earned an Associate of Science Degree for Transfer in Business Administration 2.0. He is transferring to Chico State to study Small Business Entrepreneurship.

Tribble wants to be his own boss. He feels good about his accomplishments, but doesn’t speak often to his family these days, though he did have a crowd of family members there at his graduation.

“Sometimes I just want to grab my dad or mom and give them a hug,” he said. “I have to be selfish right now to stay in control. For so long I wasn’t and had no way to hug myself or appreciate myself. Now people tell me I’m doing good. That’s all thanks to the recovery process and my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Without those things, I wouldn’t have found myself.”

Washington said could only attempt college herself once she got sober, too.

“Right now I just feel like, whoa, so excited,” she said. “People can get their lives back. I do have a story to tell. You can change if you give yourself a break and love the people who encourage you.”

Once she was ready, Washington, 47, put herself on an educational fast track. She earned a GED in less than a year in 2023 and immediately enrolled at Merced College. She’s been completing 17-plus units each semester, and taking summer school, to graduate with three degrees—an AA in Psychology, AA in Human Services and AA in Sociology and Behavioral Science.

Washington, who belongs to the Alpha Gamma Sigma and Phi Theta Kappa community college honor societies, has already begun what she hopes will be her life’s work. She started working for the Merced County Child Protective Services Department in November.

Washington is amazed by her new reality, since she approached life as a young teenager in the complete opposite way. By age 13, she’d already done enough wrong to be in regular hot water with the judicial system.

“I was always in trouble,” she said. “I didn’t know how to stay clean and sober. I grew up in San Jose, going in and out of juvenile detention. I couldn’t stop. I had my daughter when I was 14. But now I’m 20 years clean and sober, 20 years off parole. Now, this journey, I can’t stop. I won’t stop. I have a burning desire to finish.”

Washington has found her purpose and her Native American roots at Merced College.

She belongs to the Pomo people, but didn’t grow up on a reservation. By connecting with Isabel Cambridge, Merced College’s Native American Liaison who also serves as EOPS Counselor at the Los Banos Campus, Washington gets to express that side of herself.

This year, she volunteered during Cultural Awareness Day and Diversity Day. In her private time, she loves to bead, making Native American jewelry.

“And dance—I love to dance whenever I can,” Washington said. “I go to pow-wows whenever I can. I do all kinds of stuff to celebrate my culture now.”

Her graduation cap even featured a design that a friend from the Yaqui tribe created with a single eagle feather.

“All of these great things keep happening,” Washington said. “I don’t even know how to act. Because of my age, I’m happy where I am. It was a lot of hard work just to get here. I am so excited. I’m doing it!”

Wendy Fong knows too well the additional degrees of difficulty involved in pursuing a college degree while serving time.

But Fong has actually excelled in ways no Merced College student, incarcerated or not, ever has.

In 2024, Fong helped found the Phi Iota Rho—it stands for Wisdom, Action, Destiny—Chapter of AGS at CCWF and currently serves as its president. So she was eligible to apply for AGS scholarships this spring.

AGS members from chapters at the 116 CCC schools, and the only prison chapters in the state at CCWF and Valley State Prison, compete for scholarships with transcripts and personal essays.

Six students from CCWF and VSP were nominated for the academic, leadership and service scholarships, and all ranked among the top 10 percent of applicants. Five also received scholarships.

But Fong, with her 4.0 grade-point average and a compelling backstory about her work mentoring justice-impacted children with the youth diversion program at CCWF, proved the superior applicant.

Fong ranked No. 1 in the state and won a $2,000 merit scholarship as a result. Her personal statement detailed how her life stopped and started throughout her childhood in Northern California. Her parents divorced, and by the time she was a teenager, she and her mother lived in poverty.

Fong became a mother at age 15 and dropped out of high school. Three times, once in the world and twice while incarcerated, she enrolled in adult ed courses. It wasn’t until she got into the GED program at CCWF that life took a better turn for her.

“That decision changed my life in powerful ways,” she said.

Fong aced the GED exam at CCWF on her first try and finally became a college student there through Merced College Rising Scholars. She’s been a straight-A student throughout, while working a full-time job during the day and leading the domestic violence support group at CCWF at night.

Fong graduated this month with AA-T degrees in English and Communications, both with honors. She will transfer to Fresno State to pursue a sociology degree. She wants to get a master’s and then work with state and local governments to enact policy and social change.

“I want to understand what impacts people’s quality of life and find a solution to the problems, namely those within the intersection of race, poverty, and crime,” she said.

Fong’s daughter is now 32, and Fong, still serving time inside a facility, endeavors to give her love, guidance and perspective.

“I have striven for academic excellence, worked to be a good leader, and served my community in significant ways,” Fong wrote. “But perhaps more importantly, I want to show my daughter how hard I have worked to change my life path, and demonstrate to her that, no matter the circumstances, anything is achievable. My past poor choices don’t have to be hers.”