CSN student commencement speaker recalls road to graduation

After a year and a half in an on-again, off-again violent relationship, Seria Larry found herself staring into the eyes of her newborn baby boy. In that moment, she decided to finally leave her son's father.

"When I saw my son's face there was something that changed in me. All the love switched to him and switched for myself. It was a light switch and I didn't want him to be raised in that atmosphere and I didn't want him to be anything like that," Larry said.

On May 21, she told her story to 2,300 graduates at the College of Southern Nevada's 40th commencement at the Thomas & Mack Center as the student commencement speaker and described how CSN has changed her life.

Her journey to the podium began in 2006. Like many, she graduated high school and began her first semester at CSN. She did a second semester at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. But her college career stuttered when she dropped out.

She moved to Fort Collins, Colo., to get away from her aggressive ex-boyfriend. He followed her. She became pregnant and found the strength to permanently move on without him.

In Las Vegas, she moved in with her mother and took a job. As a customer service representative, she took a call one day from an elderly man who asked about her age and why she worked full time at a bank instead of attending college.

"He gave a really long lecture about the importance of college," she said.

The speech prompted her to return to CSN in spring 2010. Immersed in school, she became an active member of the CSN student body. In 2011-12, she served as the vice president for the Association of Students in Communication. This year, she served as the president of ASC and Sigma Chi Eta, the national honors society for communication and journalism majors at two-year colleges.

In May 2011, she was elected as an extension senator for student government. She is co-chair of the ASCSN Outreach Committee and serves on two other student government committees.

Larry is also an active volunteer in the community and volunteers at Safe Nest, a nonprofit organization for victims of domestic violence. This past fall semester, she organized a domestic violence awareness fair, sponsored by student government.

Last fall, she received the CSN Presidential Recognition Award for volunteering more than 100 hours. She was also the recipient of the Rhonda Jefferson Single Parent Scholarship Award through the Cultural Diversity Foundation.

This year she was named as the 2011-12 Outstanding Student of the Year for the communication department.

As a single mother, her participation in so many activities required her mother's unwavering support. When Larry had night classes, her mother would take her son to campus and wait for her to be done so they could all go home together in the car they share.

Her mother supports Larry's ambition to obtain further education.

"My grandma had nine children. Out of all the kids and all of the grandkids, no one has received their bachelor's degree," she said. "I will be the first in my family."

On the same day as graduation, Larry began a new journey and started an online bachelor's degree program in justice studies at Arizona State University. She intends to go to law school so she can help victims of domestic violence.