Delia Buzatu, a Romanian student who immigrated with her parents to America four years ago, didn't have to look far to be inspired by farm labor leader César Chávez.
"She got a funny look in her eye and then said to me, 'He was an immigrant too,' " reported Jan McKissick, Buzatu's communications instructor at Butte College. It was McKissick who had recommended that Delia apply for the CTA's César Chávez Memorial Education Awards Program - an award that was given the young student this spring.
"I wrote about farm workers and what César Chávez did for farm workers," Buzatu said. "In some ways, we are pretty much the same. We were both in a country other than our home."
In her essay for the award, in fact, Buzatu wrote about the parallel between labor organizing in California's fields and in Romania.
Prize-winning essay
"In my own native country, Romania, we have faced similar problems. We had many strikes such as the Strike of Bobalna, Horea, Closna and Crisan, and the most important of them was in 1907. In all of these strikes, they have asked for their land properties, equal rights, freedom," Buzatu wrote in her prize-winning essay.
Buzatu came to California with her parents, sister and brother and moved from Southern California to Oroville, where the family had relatives. Buzatu studied in Oroville schools, but has since enrolled in Butte College's "College Connection," a program that allows high school seniors to concurrently enroll in college. Buzatu, who speaks four languages including Romanian, French, English and Spanish, hopes to complete her college degree and become a French teacher, although McKissick says she is also a gifted public speaker. Having taught Delia's sister and mother, McKissick said, "I knew she'd be a conscientious, focused young woman, and that's exactly what she is."
The César Chávez Memorial Education Awards Program was founded in 1999 by CTA to recognize students and their teachers who demonstrate an understanding of the vision and guiding principles which César Chávez lived his life. Awards are made in a variety of grade level categories from kindergarten through community college. For their efforts, Buzatu and McKissick will each be awarded $500.