For Hurricane Evacuee And Mom, Persistence Leads To Graduation
Palmira Arroyo, left, flew in from Puerto Rico for her daughter Karina Lasalle Arroyo’s graduation from Central Connecticut State University. Lasalle, right, packed her mom’s rental car with luggage from her stay at CCSU after Hurricane Maria. Photo by Vanessa de la Torre for Connecticut Public Radio
Commencement was two days away and Karina Lasalle Arroyo had hauled out nearly seven months’ worth of luggage from her time in Connecticut.
She stood in a dormitory parking lot and confirmed she was ready to go home.
“More than ready,” Lasalle, 21, said with a laugh.
When Hurricane Maria smashed into Puerto Rico last September, Lasalle was in her final year at the University of Puerto Rico and thinking ahead to law school. But the widespread damage altered the trajectory of these best-laid plans. The storm knocked out power, and Lasalle’s night classes — courses she needed to graduate — were rescheduled to the same hour on a Saturday.
“They just told me to choose,” said Lasalle, who wants to be a prosecutor someday. “Everyone had like maybe two, three classes in the same hour, but I had all of them.”
As she contemplated what to do, a public university in the small city of New Britain, Connecticut, had placed an ad in the biggest newspaper in Puerto Rico. Central Connecticut State University was inviting college students on the island to take classes on the mainland, at least temporarily.
CCSU called its new program Airbridge and ultimately enrolled about 30 Puerto Rican evacuees as transfer students. Lasalle jumped at the offer, flying in at the end of October.