This winter, Mateo Arteaga will be going to Hawaii for a week, just to let it all sink in.
After 23 years with the university, CWU’s director of the Educational Opportunity Center (EOC) in Yakima is retiring, leaving behind a legacy of opening doors and shattering ceilings for those who might not otherwise have made their way to college. His work with the EOC has been a continuation of a lifelong passion for education and opportunity for migrant workers and other first-generation students.
“First-generation students are incredibly dedicated, because they’ve decided that they’re going to work hard for it,” said Arteaga, himself a first-gen student. “I had no set path in life, my dad was a farm worker, and through my hard work in getting an education, I was able to become an advocate for farm workers”
Arteaga grew up in the Yakima Valley farm worker community, occasionally migrating to Oregon for lima bean season. He never saw himself as a perfect student, and he didn’t have college anywhere near his radar until his mentor gave him some advice that would change his life forever.
“My first mentor was the owner of that farm who told me that an education is something nobody can take away from you,” Arteaga said. “They can throw you in jail, or any number of other things, but they can’t take away your education. So, that seed was planted early on.”
As far as passion can take you in college, experience plays an equally important part in your success. And, after he completed high school, Arteaga simply wasn’t ready for college. His counselor tore up his application when asked to review it, and he told Arteaga to pursue something else.
“I remember to this day, he should have told me to go to community college, get your skills to where they need to be, then you can transfer to a state university,” he said. “To this day, I’m grateful to him in a way, because he was right. I wasn’t ready.”
A stint in the military taught Arteaga several important lessons about teamwork, leadership, and perseverance in the face of adversity. Those experiences also taught him that the military was not the direction he wanted to go.
So, when Arteaga left, he resubmitted his application to UW in hopes of pursuing a career in teaching applied to what is now known as Yakima Valley College (YVC).
YVC fostered Arteaga’s budding passion for leadership, and in 1976, he became Washington’s first Latino student body president. Once he had his degree, he began his teaching career in North Bend, fulfilling his dream and opening the door to a career in education that would take him through several administrative positions, nonprofit work, and community outreach. Then, in 1999, Arteaga applied to work at Central.
“When I interviewed with CWU, they asked me whether I could work with school districts and nonprofits, and whether I was bilingual,” he said. “I was able to check everything off that list through my experiences.”
After getting his foot in the door, Arteaga helped the university open the Yakima EOC. As the principal investigator for the EOC, the High School Equivalency Program (HEP), and the College Assistance Migrant Program (CAMP), he acted as a liaison between the federal government and the institutions receiving the grants necessary to keep those programs running.
As those programs grew, it became necessary to branch the EOC off into its own program, under Arteaga’s direction. In his position, he has been able to leverage his knowledge of the first-generation student experience to provide prospective students and families with the knowledge they need to make informed decisions about college.
“My experience as a first-generation student has helped me guide others through the process,” Arteaga said. “My parents had no idea how the system worked, and figuring that out prepared me to save others the time.”
He specifically remembers a young woman from the CAMP program, Juanita, who wanted to go to college but her parents wouldn’t let her. Arteaga’s colleagues found a way to convince them.
“Our CAMP director and her husband went over to their house for dinner and had an honest conversation about what college is like and the opportunities it would offer their daughter, and Juanita ended up going to CWU,” he said proudly.
Arteaga’s success in running the EOC has continued over the years, leading to his role as president of the Council on Occupational Education from 2010 to 2012, and numerous recognitions and awards from the TRIO organization. His former employee and current supervisor, CWU Director of Grants Miriam Bocchetti, says Arteaga’s name is known far and wide because of his dedication to student success.
“I was in Philadelphia for a conference, on a tour bus, and a woman sat down next to me, and asked me where I was from,” Bocchetti said. “I said Washington, and she immediately asked me if I knew Mateo Arteaga. That always happens whenever I go to conferences around the country. People who are part of TRIO always ask me how Mateo is doing. He just has that impact on people.”
In 2021, Arteaga was a driving force in securing the funding to establish CWU’s second EOC in Wenatchee. With only 142 such programs nationwide, Bocchetti says EOC programs are very hard to get funded.
“It’s extremely difficult, so the fact that we not only got our Yakima EOC funded again, but also got an additional location in Wenatchee, stunned us all for a good month or so,” she said.
As he prepares himself for retirement, Arteaga offers some sage advice for students who might feel their dreams are too far out of reach.
“Never give up, no matter what happens,” he said. “There have been challenging times at CWU just like any other workplace, but I never gave up believing in my students and believing in myself to do the right thing. I’m so glad for the opportunity to be part of this team and really make a difference.”
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