My name is Juanita Lopez; I'm the second oldest of three daughters and the first to attend a university in the United States. I had not yet realized there was a story to tell regarding me being a First Generation College Student, until the spring of 1998. That spring was my first encounter with the research of First Generation College Students at CSUMB. I received an invitation to be interviewed and accepted. It wasn't until the spring of 2000 that I was again involved with the same research, but this time as a student in the Oral History class, as an interviewer, and as a re-interviewee. In the following, I want to share what my experience has been of the long term process of being involved with testimonial of First Generation College Students by being an interviewee in '98, interviewer in 2000, and a re-interviewee in 2000 as well.

    During the spring of '98 I was a freshmen attending the second semester at CSUMB. My two main concerns at that time where dealing with being away from home for the first time and learning what the campus had to offer me to make my four years smoother. I remember agreeing to the interview because it would be a new experience and because I was shocked to know they wanted me to share how I had managed to enter a four year college after being the first in my family to do so. Looking back at my interview I answered questions about my recent transition from high school to college, about the summer program I attended that got me into CSUMB, about culture shock on campus, and what changes I would had liked to see made at CSUMB. I spoke about my family, self, and culture as well, but without deep reflection from my part. After the interview I attended the class presentation of their findings and received a copy of my interview both typed and recorded on tape. I surley thought that would be the last time I would hear about the research, but it wasn't.

    In the spring of 2000, I enrolled in the Oral History & Community Memory course without knowing the class topic was again going to be First Generation College Students. Because I felt one hundred percent comfortable with the topic and could relate to the class readings as well, I found myself through out the course actively participating and engaging in most of the class discussions. I was very excited to learn that I would be able to interview two CSUMB First Generation students and be re-interview as well.

    My experience as an interviewer began with plenty of confidence due to my awareness of being an insider because both students were latinos, and because I had been interviewed on the same topic before. I wasn't certain though about the interviewing process because it was my first time doing Oral History research. Luckily, both interviewee's shared great stories. After doing self-reflection on both scenarios, I discovered I had experienced two totally different emotional dynamics during the interviews. I recall that during the first interview I tried to pull teeth. I had gone in the interview without meeting the person before hand and without letting him meet me either. I had numerous expectations regarding his answers which were built on me knowing the topic well, having been interviwed once, and having read about other cases on First Generation students as well. The second interview went much smoother, for I made sure to meet the interviewee more than once before the interview to give both a chance to feel comfortable around each other. During this interview I pretty much went with his flow. I put aside my expectations and asked questions based on what I needed to find out and on what he answered. The two very different experiences made me doubt myself as an interviewer. I thought that because one was more open to answering than the other, I had done the interviewing process wrong. It wasn't until the culmination of the course that as a whole group we shared our findings, that I realized the interviews were not meant to end up with alike stories, instead our goal was to get unique stories that would obviously share similarities but with different life experiences.

    The third part of my involvement was being re-interviewed two years later as a junior. I recall that in my first interview I only spoke for about fourty minutes and this time I spoke for about two hours. During the interview I remember as well feeling in control of the interview. Being in the class helped me gain knowledge on Oral History interviewing methods, had time to think about my own story during class, and the fact that the interviewer was my class mate made me gain the confidence necessary to share my story for that long. I rember interrupting her a couple of times to keep adding to my story. I was given the opportunity to again read my interview afterwards and found many differences in the way I answered in '98. Even though I felt after reading my '98 interview that I had a good set of feet on the ground, there was much more in depth reflection the second time around. I shared with great pride and with no fear about my personal life, support nets from my major, about my culture, family, and how my self identity had changed through out the two years.

    I've been asked to think about my unique situation several times know regarding my three way involvement with First Generation College Students Oral History, and I'm able to see now I opened up more the second time I was interviewed. I strongly believe that being interviewed twice is better, that once isn't enough to gain knowledge on a certain topic. My experience has taught me as well to put time and effort in both knowing your interviewee and letting him/her know you as well before the interview, and knowing the topic good enough as well.