Guadalupe resident Maggie Espinoza took top honors from the California Head Start association at an awards dinner on Jan. 29, when she was named Administrator of the Year for 2008.
Espinoza literally worked her way up from the bottom, joining Head Start back in 1974 as a bus driver. Now, she’s program manager for Children’s Services, overseeing services for the Santa Maria Valley, Cuyama, and Guadalupe regions.
Mattie Gatsby is Children’s Services director and Espinoza’s supervisor. She said that people working their way up through the ranks of Head Start is a fairly common occurrence, though “most people don’t go as high as program manager.”
Gatsby went on to explain why nominating Espinoza was an easy decision: “It was her skill at doing it, her willingness to upgrade both her management skills and her education.”
For her part, Espinoza said she was ecstatic when she learned she had been given the honor.
“I couldn’t believe that I had won,” she said. “I felt so honored to receive such a prestigious award.”
After working for Head Start for more than 30 years, what does Espinoza consider to be her main reason for doing it?
“Service, I think, to the community,” she said. “You’re not going to get rich working here. It’s when you see families educating themselves and taking on the roles as educators in the lives of their children.” m
Contact contributor Nicholas Walter through the editor at rmiller@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Feb 12-19, 2009.
