COURTESY

Editor's note: This is part of a series of stories published this week on Las Vegas seniors graduating from high school.

On a typical day in her junior year at Sunrise Mountain High School, Luz Diaz-Ontiveros awoke at 5 a.m. to get to the bus stop by 6:30, attended her AP and honors classes until 2 p.m., led club meetings until 4 and then hurried off to work at a local McDonald’s until 10. Then she stayed up until 3 a.m. to work on homework.

After her mother got into an accident that left her unable to work and her father had a difficult time finding a steady job, Diaz-Ontiveros had few options. While most teens were worried about getting a driver's license, Diaz-Ontiveros helped support her family.

“There were lots of sleepless nights,” Diaz-Ontiveros said.

This week her hard work pays off. Diaz-Ontiveros is set to graduate from Sunrise Mountain with a 4.43 GPA and a scholarship from the Ronald McDonald House Charities. In the fall she will start school at UNR.

It hasn't been an easy journey.

Diaz-Ontiveros was born in Paramount, Calif., just south of Los Angeles, after her parents came to the United States from Mexico looking for a better life.

Spending a short time in California and Michigan, they eventually established a home base in Las Vegas, where Diaz-Ontiveros' father got a job in construction, and her mother began cleaning houses.

Kindergarten was a challenge. Diaz-Ontiveros’ family spoke only Spanish at home, so Diaz-Ontiveros didn’t know English.

To learn, she filled Saturday and Sunday mornings with cartoons, letting shows such as the "Backyardigans," "The Fairly OddParents" and "Dora the Explorer" fill in the gaps of her knowledge. By second grade she was completely comfortable with the language.

Still, when it came time for homework in the evenings, though her parents could help her with math problems, language arts was a different story.

“I realized that I had to understand things at school or I wouldn’t have anyone to help me at home,” Diaz-Ontiveros said.

So while other students were doodling, Diaz-Ontiveros had a laser focus on what was being taught, making sure she knew exactly what the teacher was trying to say. It paid off: Throughout elementary and middle school she got good grades, joined the student council, started tutoring her peers and impressed her teachers.

At Sunrise Mountain she became president of the National Honor Society and DECA, a club for wannabe entrepreneurs. She also had a leadership role in the Spanish Honors Society and volunteered at Three Square, Valley Hospital, as a camp counselor at the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s summer camp, and returned to her middle school to help out.

The added commitment of working part time came her junior year when a car accident Diaz-Ontiveros’ junior year left her mother with two destroyed disks in her back and a torn ligament in her shoulder. Her mother told Diaz-Ontiveros she did not have to work — that the family would figure something out. But Diaz-Ontiveros wanted to contribute.

“I could see the bills coming in and piling up,” she said.

She began applying for jobs right after her 16th birthday in April. By the end of May, she had been hired to work at McDonald’s as a cashier.

During the summer Diaz-Ontivero worked nearly full time; during her junior year worked 25-35 hours a week. Though she had little time to relax or see friends, Diaz-Ontivero focused on her studies and kept her grades up.

This week at a senior awards night Diaz-Ontivero got the majority of the awards — in language arts, the school's Career and Technical Program and the Principal’s Award.

She plans to study biology and business at UNR. And after that? She hopes to become the surgeon who does her mom’s next procedure.

“I’m ready to see what life holds for me,” she said.