From Panic to Purpose: How One Student Found Her Confidence and Future at UEI
Alicia Montes sat in her car outside UEI College’s Tacoma campus, hands wrapped around a warm cup of coffee she’d grabbed just to buy herself a few extra minutes.
She had just finished another marathon shift as a caregiver, a profession she held for about a decade. Her mind raced the way it often did on difficult days, flipping between self-pep talks and future exit strategies.
“I was sitting there playing Candy Crush, trying to calm my anxiety down,” she said. “I told myself I wasn’t going to enroll.”
But instead of driving away, she remained parked, staring at the UEI sign. Eventually, she walked through the campus’s front door.
That moment became the turning point Alicia didn’t know she’d been waiting for. Once she stepped inside, everything began to shift in her life.
Over the following months, Alicia found her confidence and rediscovered her love of learning. She finished her classes, became a Student Ambassador, completed her externship, and built a community that depended on her leadership.
And recently, she accepted a job offer in hematology and oncology — the next step in a journey that may never have happened if she’d stayed in her car that day in UEI Tacoma’s parking lot.
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From Crisis to Caregiving
Long before UEI College, Alicia’s biggest fight was for stability. She had been in a domestic violence situation but was eventually able to escape it with her kids. They later ended up in a homeless shelter that required her to quickly find work.
Feeling the pressure, Alicia responded to a number of employment ads, including one seeking caregivers. The urgency she felt came through during her initial phone call.
“I called and said, ‘Are you going to hire me or not?’” she said. “They told me to come in. I told them my story, and they hired me before I even finished the interview.”
That job turned into 11 years of intense, demanding work at a home caregiving facility. Her responsibilities ranged from personal care to catheter assistance, and the role required long shifts and learning new skills on the fly.
“It was all new to me, but I thrived. I loved my clients,” she said. “The only downside was no benefits. I needed something more stable.”
She eventually earned her Home Care Aide (HCA) license and tried transitioning into new employment during COVID. But with severe PTSD from past personal experiences, every new assignment was a battle.
“I’d sit outside a new client’s house and cry for 30 minutes before I could go in,” she said.
Still, she pushed through — eventually finding herself in UEI Tacoma’s parking lot one day on her way home from work.
Leaping Toward Her Future
When Alicia first walked into UEI Tacoma, she had a firm set of conditions she fully expected would be dealbreakers. Because of her dual roles as a mom and a professional caregiver, she could only take classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and she couldn’t be in class later than 10 p.m.
The UEI admissions representative’s response surprised her.
“He said, ‘Great! Classes end at 10.’ And I just said, ‘I hate you,’” she laughed.
She still took a couple of days to consider the move, but eventually she returned to UEI and enrolled in the Medical Assistant program. Six months later, the person who was once terrified of stepping inside the building had become a cornerstone of her cohort.
“I made sure my classmates made it to class because I wanted them to graduate with me,” she said. “I gave everyone my number. I helped them study, get through SIMs or Career Edge — whatever they needed. I let them practice on me as much as they wanted.”
Her instructors made a lasting impact on Alicia and her classmates as well.
“Ms. Kayla Wilson is great — very thorough,” she said. “Ms. Jessica Keeley is super personable and down-to-earth, and Ms. Fawn Sterling and Ms. Lauren Mendoza are the same. There are a lot of people there that I absolutely loved.”
The combination of support, challenge, and community reignited something in her.
“I can absolutely say I was very happy learning and very happy helping other people,” she said. “It got me through some tough times. It made me realize how much I really love school.”
Alicia recently completed her externship at an OB-GYN office and was offered a job. But during the shutdown, plans changed. Then came another opportunity she couldn’t turn down — a position at a cancer clinic that she began in mid-November.
Her long-term dream is to work in radiology, specifically ultrasound.
“Now that I’m stable, I want to build onto where I wanted to be in life,” she said. “I want more from life, and I want to reach more people.”
UEI, Alicia said, didn’t just improve her skills — it gave her the courage she was looking for.
“I was deathly afraid of the unknown,” she said. “I took a chance coming to this school. Now I’m confident and excited about the future. UEI helped me rediscover my love of learning, and because of that, I’m not afraid to see how far I can go.”
