This is one in a series of stories about out 2020-2021 alumni scholarship recipients.
Christina Giese first tried to go to college after graduating from Bakersfield’s West High School in the spring of 1993. Then life intervened.
That September, at age 18, she met her future husband at Bakersfield College. By October they were dating and within a year they were married and had welcomed their first child, a son. Over the next year they bought a house and welcomed their oldest daughter.
“God's timing sometimes feels more like a tornado,” Giese joked.
Giese attempted to return to college several times, but two more children came and she took it to mean her job was to raise her children and support her husband as he pursued his degrees and high school teaching career.
Her turn finally came in 2013 when her two oldest were in college and her two youngest in high school.
“Pretty soon it was going to be a matter of, ‘Everyone’s out of high school, what’s mom going to do?’”
What Giese did is earn degrees from Bakersfield College and CSUB – taking some classes with her older two children – and is now seeking her master’s degree in English and clearing her credentials to teach high school.
Thanks to the Kern High Teacher Residency program, a partnership between CSUB and the Kern High School District to recruit and train teachers, she already has a couple years of teaching under her belt, including a solo turn at Arvin High School this past year.
It’s been a “joy” watching her achieve her dreams, said Giese’s oldest daughter, Amber.
“When she got her undergrad, she was basically just this burst of joy, like ‘I did it! I did it!’” said Amber, who will be a double CSUB alumna herself when she finishes up her master’s in English this winter. “And you can’t help but feel super excited along with her.”