Making sacrifices to smooth the hard road

(CANBY) — Sometimes, pursuing a goal that seems out of reach can be incredibly difficult and deflating.

In Canby, Javan Hernandez clearly understands those feelings and struggles, but he’s learned that reaching a goal is worth the struggle to fulfill his parents' hopes and dreams — the dream of higher education and a better life.

Come the fall, this year’s Pamplin Media Group Amazing Kid for the Canby area will make that dream a reality. He’ll enroll as a freshman at the University of Oregon and keep dreaming bigger dreams.

The trip south to Eugene did not come easy. His parents emigrated to the United States from Mexico and have pushed their oldest, Javan, and his four other siblings to make the most of this opportunity.

In short, to work hard at it.

“Since I was young, my parents told me they wanted me to keep studying, so I wanted to do this for them,” Hernandez said. “I’ve seen all the hard work they’ve put into me and my siblings. Now, I want to give myself a better shot out in the real world.”

To do that, Hernandez didn’t get the chance to enjoy a regular high school experience. There weren’t clubs, sports, or other extracurricular activities in his life, just the goal, the work, and the knowledge that what the future held wasn’t just for him but for those who came after him.

“I wanted to be the first to go to college, but it was hard,” he said. “It’s very easy to get off track in high school and middle school. People around you aren’t going to school or not doing the work, but I worked hard at staying disciplined and did the work. There were a lot of late nights doing homework or studying for tests. I did get tempted to sleep in sometimes or not go to school, but I wanted to be an example to my siblings. The big part was staying disciplined.”

And all this hard work and sacrifice are heading somewhere, said Hernandez. Somewhere better. Ultimately, all the struggle, grit, and determination are the price he said he was willing to pay.

“I want to own my own business one day,” he said. “That’s always been my mentality. Good things don’t come easy, and I just knew that in order to get those big things, it would come from all the small things — raising my hand in class for help, putting myself out there in class, participating and staying active in class.”

It hasn’t always been a smooth ride on the highway of hard knocks. As a freshman, Hernandez suffered through the pandemic year, then spent his sophomore year just trying to get acclimated to high school. By his senior year, he was involved in a leadership class, filming videos and other projects, but he said he lamented not getting more involved. It’s a lesson he has passed on to his two siblings, who are now in high school. He hopes to pass it on to his other two, who are still in middle school.

“I didn’t do a lot of things in high school, and I regret it,” he said. I tell my siblings to join clubs, do sports, and get involved. I want them to have the experience of having teammates, coaches, or teachers guiding them — to experience the things I couldn’t.”

But while he acknowledges the things he missed out on via his devotion to the task at hand, he also knows that he’s setting the table for the rest of his siblings. And that, he noted, has always been important to him.

“I’m passing the lessons I’ve learned onto them,” he explained. “I’m paving the way for them and hoping they can go through it easier and experience the most out of it.”

The goal of being a business owner crystallized a little more than a year ago when his mother was ill, and money was tight for the family. Looking for ways to save dollars, Hernandez got into cutting hair. At first, it was simply to save the barber fees his family incurred from haircuts every two to three weeks. Soon, word spread, and Hernandez cut hair for family, friends, and schoolmates. It proved to be a bit of a business awakening for him.

“I kind of fell in love with the whole entrepreneur aspect of it,” he said. “I was able to see that I have the potential to do something successful from the ground up, and I just want to do it on a bigger scale. I walk around Canby High and see my work on people’s heads. I’m very proud of it.

A lot of people think I’m going to go into barbering, but it’s just a hobby,” he added. “I’m definitely looking at the bigger picture.”

He'll enroll at the U of O this fall and hopes to earn enough scholarship money to get all four years and pursue a degree in business administration and entrepreneurship. He hopes to immerse himself in campus life and live some of those experiences he missed while burning the academic midnight oil in high school. No matter what comes, Hernandez feels ready for it.

“I know it won’t be easy, and nothing good comes easy, but I‘m a hard-working person and ready for whatever challenges I’ll face in the upcoming years,” he said. “I’m gritty, resilient, unbothered by challenges, and a problem-solver.”