Vanessa Castellanos was born on August 3, 1989 in Pajacuran, Michoacan (www.paxacu.com.mx) Mexico. She migrated to the United States along with her mother  and her sister. After immigrating to Oakland CA, Vanessa had a hard time adapting to society because she had to learn a new language.

            Her father is a construction worker, and her mother a homemaker. Her parents are the inspiration for her to do excellent in her school work since the point of her family migrating was to help her receive an education that her parents didn’t receive.

            Now Vanessa Castellanos has been living in the United States for about seven years, and she is currently at Unity High School, where she is a proud graduating senior of 2008. She is active in her academics in which she always holds great grades and is going to be Valedictorian of the senior class. The extracurricular activities she is participating are Martial Arts, Fundraiser, creator of dance club. Vanessa also participated in the Southern California trip, which was an opportunity offered to outstanding students, to visit colleges to have a clear option of what colleges she wants to apply to.

            Outside of school Vanessa likes to hang out with her friends, go to the mall, movies, and parties.

            Vanessa applied several universities, including UC Davis, UC Merced, and UC Santa Barbara, all of which she has been accepted to, Vanessa plans to major in Psychology in college.