For San Benito High School valedictorian Clara Jimenez, her academic experience at the Hollister campus could be summed up in two words: hard work.
“You can’t be defined by your failures,” she told the Free Lane on Monday on her first day of summer. “Like you’re not defined by how well you do in things and your grades don’t really define your character.”
Jimenez, 17, graduated with a cumulative GPA of 4.29 but told her class she wasn’t perfect, highlighting the fact that she failed her first calculus test and several quizzes in physics before finding success. The teen also struggled with obsessive compulsive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder her entire life, something some of her teachers didn’t know until last year, she explained in an email to the Free Lance.
“I feel many people look at the valedictorian and assume it was easy to be the valedictorian,” she said in her address. “I am not an extremely intelligent person and I never have been. What I am—what I accept—is that I work hard.”
Jimenez will be continuing to work hard at University of California, Berkeley in the fall where she’ll major in English with an emphasis in creative writing. She plans to become a published fiction author.
“I always really liked to write and when I was in middle school I read a lot of stuff by Tolkien and just the way he created an entire universe in his stories kind of inspired me to create my own universe,” she said.
Jimenez’s parents came to the U.S. from Mexico in the 1980s and her first language was Spanish. At eight years old, she started learning English.
Jimenez first set her eyes on the prestigious academic honor of valedictorian four years ago when she watched her older sister, Saray Jimenez, graduate from San Benito High School.
“I had known I wanted to be valedictorian since I went to my sister’s graduation and saw her valedictorian speak,” the student said.
When Jimenez isn’t studying, she has volunteered at the library and participated in Club Ed, which provides tutoring to other students. She was a member of the League of United Latin American Citizens. She played flute in the band for three years. Jimenez also followed her interest in the environment and participated in the treehugger and outdoor clubs.
“In a few years, most of us will still be in college but some of us will be paying rent or raising families,” Jimenez told the audience last week. “That’s some heavy stuff, guys.”
There were a few laughs. Then valedictorian delivered her final advice in the words of one of her favorite authors, JRR Tolkien.
“Remember as Tolkien once said, ‘All we have to decide is what to do with the time given us,’” she said.
