A newly appointed judge in the 洛杉矶 County Superior Court, Angel’s time at Occidental afforded him experiences that proved valuable throughout his career. He describes those who were the most influential during crucial years of his life and offers some advice to current Oxy students.
Angel has served as a Commissioner at the 洛杉矶 County Superior Court since 2022 and has been a Sole Practitioner since 2010. He served as a Supervising Deputy Federal Public Defender at the Federal Public Defender’s Office, Central District of California from 2004 to 2010 and served as a Deputy Federal Public Defender there from 1992 to 2004. Navarro earned a Juris Doctor degree from the University of California, 洛杉矶 School of Law.
在奥施康定的难忘时刻
When I was a senior at Oxy, I was getting ready to graduate. I was actually trying to get a triple major, if you can believe it. 我想加一个历史专业. But I got called into the Dean's office and they told me that I couldn't do it because although I had taken AP calculus in high school, Oxy was not going to give me credit for my AP calculus exam because I hadn't taken a single math class at Oxy. 所以我回到了我的高中, 我和我的AP微积分老师Jaime埃斯卡兰特谈过了, 告诉他发生了什么. 他是我生命中非常鼓舞人心的人. 他告诉我，我可以(在大学数学上取得成功). 所以我在奥施康定上了基础微积分课. I was a senior and there were all these pre-med students, all these first-years. And I got 100% in every test and I got 100% in the final and I finished it in an hour. 我记得教授用我的考试作为关键. I was very proud that after four years of being away from math, I was still able to do pretty well. 太酷了.
詹姆·埃斯卡兰特的影响
Jaime埃斯卡兰特 在80年代成为了一名非常受欢迎的数学老师. 当我在高中的时候, 就在我上他课的前一年, 他的学生被指控在AP微积分考试中作弊, 所以他们不得不重考，他们都通过了, the ones that were able to take it [as depicted in the film Stand and Deliver]. So when I came in the following year, we were a “test class.“我记得当时有很多媒体关注我们. And I know that of the 33 of us who took it, 31 passed, including myself. And I took that experience from the AP calculus class and I really used it to keep me motivated throughout college, 整个法学院, and really throughout my legal career because he was so inspirational in my life. I kept in contact with him even as I got older and I became a lawyer. I remember he invited a few of us to go with him to Sacramento in 2006 because he was being honored by the Governor's office. I was his unofficial attorney because most of his other students were studying engineering. 他对我的生活影响很大. Whenever I had a doubt about anything, I would always go back to the stuff I learned in calculus. And to this day, to be honest, I think about him all the time.
从十大正规网赌平台到加州大学洛杉矶分校法学院
我认为西方学校是一个很好的学校. Now that I'm older and I am doing what I'm doing, I have a lot of fond memories of the place. I have friends from Occidental that I still keep in contact with. 我觉得那是个好地方. It was close to home, and I wanted to be close to home, to East 洛杉矶. 我很享受在奥施康定的时光.
When I went to UCLA back in 1997, I got in through real affirmative action. 在奥施康定，我是个B -的学生. 我在大学里不是一个特别好的学生. I had a lot of gaps in my education because I didn’t come to school in this country until I was 10 years old. 所以当我开始服用奥施康定时，已经是八年后了. 我的分析能力不是最好的. My writing skills were not the best, but I was good at math. So when I got to UCLA, I was still learning a lot of things. But I noticed right away that Oxy had prepared me a lot better than high school had in many ways. Even though I struggled in law school and it was hard for me, the experiences I learned at Oxy helped me challenge myself. And I applied those skills when I was at UCLA Law and I got through law school somehow. 我参加了律师考试，第一次没有通过. 我又考了一次，然后我通过了. 我成为了一名律师，从未回头.
给Oxy学生的建议
在Oxy挑战自己. Don’t be so focused on only getting through college and graduating, make sure to take advantage of all the opportunities that you have. For example, I would definitely recommend studying abroad if you can. A lot of my friends at Oxy traveled abroad, either to Spain or England. It is always something I personally regret not experiencing. I think it is important for students to challenge themselves in areas they aren’t so familiar with and step out of their comfort zone.
How Occidental Helped Him Reconnect With a Former Teacher
When I became a lawyer (I’ve been a lawyer for about 15 years), I wanted to find the very first teacher I ever had in this country, 因为我出生在这里, 但我是在墨西哥长大的. 然而，当我回到美国.S. 我在四年级. 我不知道这些, 但我四年级的老师是ESL学生, 那是他第一年教书. I didn't know any of this until later on, so I went looking for him. 我想感谢他. I went to my old elementary school, but I couldn't find him. 我听说他是一个乐队的乐手. 还是没有运气. 我想让他知道，他的一个孩子表现得很好. 所以有一天我拿到了我的西方杂志. There in the magazine was a story about an Occidental professor who was teaching students who want to become teachers. 是我以前的老师! 我四年级的老师上了Oxy杂志. 疯狂的故事. 于是我给他写了一封信. I wrote a four-page letter telling him what I've done and I thanked him. 然后他打电话给我. 我是联邦公设辩护律师事务所的律师. He called me, and the phone rang, and I picked it up, and it was him. And that was the first time we had talked since fourth grade. And he told me that my letter made him cry and that he shared my letter with his future teachers to tell them that's the reason why you want to become a teacher. So, to me, that tells me everything about Oxy—that I was at Oxy, and it keeps coming back to my life. 这位老师，现在是Oxy教授，是教授. 罗恩Solorzano. He was someone that I reached out to because he was very influential in my life as well.