DUPLIN COUNTY, N.C. (WITN) – Elier Marquez-Chavez received a list of scholarship offers totaling $4 million dollars.
Marquez-Chavez worked on a pig farm in Duplin County his whole life.
His reality changed once he opened acceptance letter from a number of high-profile universities across the United States. He applied to 18 colleges including 3 ivy league schools, and got accepted into 14 of them.
“More than anything else, though, it meant a lot to me knowing that I could get into these Ivy League schools,” said Marquez-Chavez. “Just by leveraging the experiences I’ve had here as a rural student.”
Those Ivy League universities include Yale, Cornell, and Columbia. When his family heard about the scholarships, they were overjoyed, including him.
“I took that burden off of them, knowing that I can go to school for free and study something I want to study,” said Marquez-Chavez. “Then, ultimately, come back and give back to my community.”
Mary Jo Robinson works at Wallace-Rose Hill High School as the guidance counselor. She speaks highly of Marquez-Chavez.
“He’s learned how to work out in life too and done some work, so all that stuff has helped prepare him for the journey he’s about to jump on,” Robinson told WITN.
While AP History teacher Thomas Naramore, who worked closely with Marquez-Chavez, saw his promise from the beginning.
“No surprise at all, he has the drive. He has the effort and intelligence, this is exactly what I expected, and I am expecting a lot of greater things from him.”
Marquez-Chavez will attend Duke University in August 2025.
He got waitlisted at Boston College and NYU, but didn’t get into Harvard and Dartmouth.
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