Simar Perez | Photo submitted by Simar Perez
Simar Perez is chasing the American dream while forfeiting his own.
Perez, 21, finds happiness on the soccer field. He started his college soccer career at Wright State University but transferred to Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, in hopes of getting more playing time.
Chasing dreams
He knows every time he leaves the field, he leaves his dreams behind.
Perez wants to be a soccer coach, but instead, he’s studying computer science.
“I think for me, I feel the pressure that society’s telling me to get a college education and that’s the only way that I will be successful in life,” Perez said.
Perez, a second-generation Mexican-American, and first-generation college student is not alone. Since 2000, children from immigrant families account for 60 percent of the growth in college students nationwide. With that growth comes the pressure to succeed.
Perez graduates in December and becomes the first in his family with a college degree. Perez said his family takes pride in his hard work while he pursues his education. Perez wants to have children one day and raise them as he has been — let them make their own career choices and know they have their father’s support.
“Being Hispanic, we don’t always get the same opportunities without a college degree,” Perez said.
The numbers back him up.
The Economic Policy Institute, in a 2017 report, said, Hispanic men made almost 15 percent less in hourly wages when compared with white men. This means people of Hispanic descent are often paid less than a non-Hispanic person, and although the gap has been minimized over the past few years, it is still significant.
While Perez battles with societal pressure, he feels no pressure being a first-generation college student from his family.
“My family has always supported me and it helps knowing I don’t have pressure from my family to be successful; they just want me to be happy.”
SoHam Dave has his father’s support, just like Perez. And just like Perez he feels the push and pulls of what he wants to do against what he feels he should do.
Coaching passion
Dave, 25, serves as a graduate assistant volleyball coach at the University of Miami, Ohio, and has an undergraduate degree in neuroscience from Wright State University.
Dave’s parents emigrated from Gujarat, India, in 2008 and, as the first person in his family to attend college in America, he feels cultural pressure to be successful.
His desire to coach volleyball means, following his passion regardless of the cultural pressures he feels. He feels this pressure every day.
“Within my community, I am an outcast, right? My parents are saying, ‘Hey, he’s getting his masters for free so why does it concern you.’ I have found my Indian culture has applied expectations upon me not only to be a doctor, someone in STEM, or someone in neuroscience but to be the most successful person in that field.”
Dave’s father, Pragnesh, has three biochemistry degrees from India and works for a biotech company in Chicago.
Dave wants to be a head coach of a Power Five conference. To qualify as a Power Five conference means being an elite conference for volleyball. The current Power Five conferences are the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), Big Ten Conference, Big 12 Conference, Pac-12 Conference, and Southeastern Conference (SEC).
Being Indian-American, Dave spoke of the slim representation amongst head coaches.
There have been less than 10 head coaches and assistant coaches of Indian- American descent in all NCAA sports, from the years 2012-2020.
Dave says if he gives up on his coaching dreams, he has a neuroscience degree to fall back on, but he will regret his decision for the rest of his life. Perez knows soccer will always be a part of his life but is sacrificing his passion because of societal pressure to work in the computer science field.
“I know choosing computer science over coaching soccer could be a decision I regret, and it sucks living my life with a ‘what if’ mindset but I feel like there is not another option for me. Computer science brings stability while coaching brings uncertainty.”
