MEET OUR GRADUATES: Destiny Zepeda is Invested in Student Success

Raised on the South Side of Providence by her Dominican grandmother, Destiny Zepeda has taken her destiny in her own hands.

She is a straight-A student and the first in her family to graduate high school and college. She graduates from RIC with a B.A. in youth development and has been accepted into RIC’s master’s degree in youth development program. However, it was through her internship at CREAR Futuros that Zepeda realized how she wanted to use her degree.

CREAR Futuros was established by the Hispanic Federation to address barriers that prevent Latinos from earning a college degree. The federation works with higher education partners like RIC to boost Latino student GPA, retention, course completion and graduation rates.

To fulfill her internship requirement for her degree, Zepeda became a peer mentor for CREAR Futuros. She recruited eight mentees, with her office in 060 Craig-Lee Hall.

“As a peer mentor, my role was to help students navigate college and get connected to resources so they could complete college successfully,” she says. “But after interning there, I knew that this is what I wanted to do with my career.”

Zepeda says most of her mentees came in wanting help with figuring out their major. “I think advisors expect you to know what you want to do once you’re out of high school, but that’s not realistic for an 18-year-old. A lot of my mentees, and even myself as a first-generation college student, went to college because that’s what our families expected of us. But once we got here, we didn’t know what to do.”

To help give her direction, Zepeda reached out to Student Support Services for help. “They sat me down and asked me what my interests were. I had never been asked that question before,” she says. “They also helped me navigate college. Whether you have a problem at home or a financial problem, they treat the whole person. I love the advisors there.”

Two other offices were also mainstays of support for Zepeda during her tenure at RIC: the Preparatory Enrollment Program (PEP), which provides comprehensive support and advising for first year students, and the Youth Development Program.

Zepeda hopes to provide the same support to students in her future career as a college mentor/advisor. “I love listening to people and helping them figure things out,” she says. “I look at where they are and where they want to go and then help them figure out the in-between steps to getting there.”

“Destiny is a big-picture thinker,” remarks Assistant Professor of Youth Development Victoria Restler. “She’s highly reflective about her own experiences and leads with attunement, care and connection. She’s a gift to the Youth Development Program at RIC and to our field of youth work.”