Daniel Woolfolk

Published May 7, 2009

By Daniel Woolfolk

The commencement speaker for Pima Community College’s May 21 graduation ceremony says her associate degree did not come easily.

Heather Myers, now 28, had a son the summer after her freshman year at Rincon High School during a year of being a ‘rebellious teenager.”

Continuing high school didn’t seem like an option. “I knew I wasn’t gonna return,” she said during an interview at her Marana home.

Her son, Damian, sat next to her. He’s now an 11-year-old sixth grader at Ironwood Elementary, who loves baseball and likes school. He also helps around the house.

“If he was a bad kid, I wouldn’t be able to do this stuff,” Myers said.

During commencement, Myers will receive an associate degree in business. She earned a general studies associate degree in 2007 but she did not participate in the graduation ceremony.

She will attend the University of Arizona South Commerce Program, and hopes to eventually earn a master’s degree in business administration from UA’s Eller College of Management.

It’s been a long road.

After taking a two-year hiatus from high school, Myers enrolled at Aztec Middle College in Fall 1999. The alternative high school sponsored by PCC allows students to finish their last two years at a quicker pace than a traditional high school while earning college credits.

Because she left high school after her freshman year, Myers did not have enough credits to enroll. “I had to fight to get into the program because of that,” she said.

She was eventually admitted, and graduated in the spring of 2000.

While attending Aztec Middle College, Myers compiled a portfolio of her life’s accomplishments. It shows a certificate of achievement from Brichta Elementary School and a certificate from a runway show in which she modeled for Dillards.

In addition to modeling, Myers appeared in a Fox 11 Kids’ Club commercial. Damian listened closely as his mother explained that her youthful goal was to be an actor.

“It’s what we all wanna do, mom,” he said.

Myers never made a career of acting but did attend PCC on and off, full time and part time, since 2001. She has been dating her boyfriend, Daniel Mora, 29, for more than five years and began working for the Muscular Dystrophy Association about four years ago.

In addition to producing an internal “Spotlight” newsletter for MDA, she handles phone calls from the general public. Some callers are emotionally distraught because they’ve just found out they have debilitating muscular diseases such as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

A co-worker, Christina Arrellin, 35, has seen Myers in action.

“Heather is just unbelievable to sit there and listen to what they have to say,” Arrellin said.

In the past two years or so, Arrellin’s 10-year-old son, Jordan, and Damian have become good friends and Arrellin has seen how Myers balances all aspects of her life.

“She’s able to juggle work, juggle school and meet the needs of her son,” Arrellin said.

Myers said she plans on working at MDA in some capacity even after she earns her undergraduate and graduate degrees.

She isn’t fazed by having been a teenage mother.

“People can call me a statistic,” she said. “That isn’t going to determine who I am.”

In the life achievement portfolio she has kept for so many years, next to a high school graduation photo, she wrote how proud she was of graduating and how she will never forget the hardships she overcame.  She was the speaker at that graduation.

And on May 21, she will share her story at yet another graduation.