SAN ANGELO, Texas — Senior year of high school, and all of the celebrations that are a part of it, is something many students look forward to for all of their grade school years. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has cut senior year short for many high-schoolers, including events like prom and graduation.
“The disappointment of not being able to walk the hallways one last time, those last moments with our friends that we look forward to...that was taken from them," Jenna Espinoza, the mother of a high school senior out of West Dallas, said.
This feeling of disappointment for high school seniors is what led to the creation of 'Adopt a Senior - Texas.' 'Adopt a Senior - Texas,' is dedicated to recognizing seniors and their accomplishments, as well as finding them "adopters," who usually send small gifts to the students.
"A gift, a T-shirt basket, a gift basket, a snack basket - their faces light up as if it was Christmas time," Anita Marquez, an administrator of 'Adopt a Senior - Texas,' said. "We do discourage people from sending money because that's not what it's about. It's just a way to help our seniors get through everything. If anything, they can look back on this and say, 'you know, a total stranger sent me this, and it all wasn't lost.'"
The administrators of the group, Jenna Espinoza, Anita Marquez, and Sandy Mireles, are all mothers of high school seniors. All of their children have received gifts from their 'adopters.'
“I think her name was Cindy, she adopted mine. She brought them flowers, got them gift cards to their favorite stores...I didn’t even know her," Mireles said.
The most special thing about the group, according to Espinoza, is the way people are 'paying it forward.'
“Even other parents of other seniors that have been adopted, they pay it forward and pick up a senior themselves. That’s what’s great: everybody just wants to recognize everybody else’s senior, and it’s kind of becoming a community," she said.
For more information on 'Adopt a Senior - Texas,' you can find the group on Facebook.