{"id":421,"date":"2022-05-18T12:50:30","date_gmt":"2022-05-18T16:50:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/small-town-big-world\/?p=421"},"modified":"2022-05-18T12:51:18","modified_gmt":"2022-05-18T16:51:18","slug":"karole-iraheta","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/small-town-big-world\/karole-iraheta\/","title":{"rendered":"Karole Iraheta’s Education (for Service)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Profile text: Adam Kimble<\/em>\nEdited by: Sam Purkiss<\/em>\nAudio Profiles: Jaydn Forbes and Clayton Van Horn<\/em><\/pre>\n\n\n\n
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The Irahetas pose for a family Christmas photo. Karole is at far right.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
Karole Iraheta knows how it feels to be looked at like an outsider. She remembers going to other towns, like Spencer, for a track meet, and receiving uncomfortable glances when she talked to her parents in Spanish. She also knows what it is like when her whole family has to squeeze into four different apartments when they go to Oklahoma to celebrate Christmas. When her extended family comes to Storm Lake, however, the whole crew can fit into her parents\u2019 house, cousins and all. No one scowls at Spanish in Storm Lake; they probably understand it, and if they don\u2019t, it doesn\u2019t sound so different anymore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Iraheta recognizes the uniqueness of Storm Lake. Her favorite holiday, the Fourth of July, is special in the small town. \u201cI think if I lived in a bigger city, like in California, it wouldn’t be the same,\u201d she said. \u201cStorm Lake is full of diversity, so we get to experience all different types of food during the Fourth of July, like in the same location by the lake, which I think plays a big part for my family.\u201d        <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Iraheta\u2019s father fled civil war in his home country of El Salvador, and her mother is an immigrant from Mexico who fell in love with the United States while visiting California. Iraheta remembered, \u201cI think my mom came as a tourist and she just kind of decided to stay in the United States.\u201d Her family has been in Storm Lake for twenty-five years, where she was born and raised. Like so many others working to make a decent living, her parents made the move to town once they heard that Tyson was hiring.

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He’d always do overtime at the plant because he knew expenses and everything, and he didn’t want my mom to risk being caught by immigration or anything. If you work without proper documents, it’s worse for your immigration status.<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Her father began his work at Tyson on the line to support the family. Her mother didn\u2019t work outside the home due to her immigration process, a ten-year devotion. The entire family felt the burdens of the United States\u2019 complicated and time-consuming immigration procedures. Iraheta recalled her father\u2019s sacrifices to keep the family afloat: \u201c<\/strong>He’d always do overtime at the plant because he knew expenses and everything, and he didn’t want my mom to risk being caught by immigration or anything. If you work without proper documents, it’s worse for your immigration status. My dad didn’t want to risk her being deported, so he took on the extra burden to work more.\u201d Meanwhile, her mother took to the arduous tasking of raising a family. Her older sister got a job VT Industries, and Iraheta works as a quality assurance inspector for QSI, a company in charge of inspecting the machines and controlling the chemical concentrations inside Tyson\u2019s Storm Lake plant. Like many second-generation folks, Iraheta\u2019s life could not be more different than that of her parents. They worked diligently so that her and her siblings could grow up with better opportunities.

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