VOLUME 5
CORONADO’S CONNECTION TO THE MAINLAND
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| VOLUME 7 | NOVEMBER 2022
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ISSUE 5
CORONADOREVIEW.COM
A Publication of Local Umbrella Media
TEACHERS OF THE YEAR DURING THE TIME OF A PANDEMIC The San Diego Unified School District announced the selection of three teachers of the year – Kelly Ann Young, Paula Richardson, and Deirdre Fabian.
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REPRESENTING AMONG THE STARS Kelly Ann Young
SDUSD Teacher Of The Year
Engineer Kat Echazarreta inspires from groundbreaking heights
REPRESENTING AMONG THE STARS YOUR REAL ESTATE IN CORONADO Engineer Kat Echazarreta inspiresEXPERT from groundbreaking heights
Editors note: This article first appeared in San Diego Magazine and is reprinted with permission of publisher. By Nicolle Monico Realtor®
documentary on Netflix, which chronicled her fight to be heard in the industry as a Hispanic woman. It’s the same feeling I had watching her halftime performance with Shakira at the Superbowl in 2020.
Ken Pecus
(619) 977-8419
LOCAL LISTINGS
ly expected) in Hispanic families, especially for daughters: she put family first. She stayed local, on supporting her mom and caring forView her siblings. Pageher It was “an opportunity,” she recalls,Back to adjust plans, but not to abandon them completely. “From a very young age, [my mom] always led me to believe that I could do whatever I wanted—that it was really up to me,” says Echazarreta. “I just told myself, ‘Okay, you have an opportunity to go as far as you want to, so let’s take advantage of that.’”
SCROLLING TIKTOK ONE NIGHT, I came ken@kenpecus.com across a video of a little girl watching her mom’s I felt seen. It matters that Echazarreta dons the cover of laptop. The child was only half-interested in magazines; that her story is told over, and over, what was being displayed, music from The Little 1019 Isabella Ave, Coronado 92118 again. It matters that I write it as a first-generation Mermaid playing in the background. KenPecus.com American and Latina. For BIPOC people, our And then, she stopped all activityDRE# and her tiny 01056969 starting line is often 400 meters behind everyone eyebrows raised. It’s subtle, but her CHS surprise is Grad 1983 and Sacred Heart School Grad 1979 The College Years else’s. But stories like hers, and the countless oththere. A brown-skinned Ariel had appeared on Three years later, Echazarreta was accepted to ers who have accomplished the seemingly imposscreen and looked exactly like this little girl—a UCLA in 2016 and continued her path toward sible, remind us that our goals—while harder and first for the classic character and the little girl an electrical engineering degree. But she quickly often requiring more work—are still obtainable. watching it. Local News LocalUmbrellaNews.com /LocalUmbrellaMedia @LocalUmbrellaMedia Advertise? Press@LocalUmbrella.com learned that what had come easy to her in the Echazarreta’s time in space was quick, a total Next year, the live-action remake of the 1989 past would no longer be the case. of 12 movie will feature an African American actress, “One of the hardest things I had to deal with minutes from takeoff to landing; but her path Halle Bailey, as Ariel. It’s not only heartwarmat UCLA [was that] I was average, and someto the stars took much longer. ing, it’s historic. It took Disney 55 years before times I was not even average. Sometimes I was they introduced a non-white princess, and 70 lucky just to pass,” she says. years before a Black one made her debut in Early Obstacles Her health and well-being quickly took a 2009. There are hundreds of these videos, with “My first memory is coming to our first turn. She wasn’t sleeping, wasn’t eating well, and children lighting up over seeing themselves on home in Tijuana, after we got off the plane,” when she would spend 30 minutes in the cafetethe big screen. says Echazarreta, who was born in Guadalajara, ria, she’d beat herself up for not using that time This past June, 26-year-old Katya Echazarreta Mexico. “The house was empty, so my parents to get her grades up. made history when she became the first Mexjust put together a whole bunch of blankets and “You definitely reach these moments where ican-born woman and the youngest woman comforters on the floor... We all just huddled up you’re like, ‘Oh my goodness, for so long I to travel into space. A San Diego City College on the blankets with our little airplane sand-