Filipino role models

Filipino role models
Rodel Rodis, Jan 16, 2007

We all need role models, people who blaze trails for us, who inspire us to achieve more and do more with our lives, and who provide us with the confidence to get to where we want to go.

Filipinos who have professional aspirations look to the examples of those who came before them to draw inspiration from on how they dealt with adversity, and how they overcame whatever obstacles stood in their way to achieve success in their fields.

It must have been very difficult for Eleanor Oducayen when she attended the prestigious Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California in Berkeley in 1969. There were no other Pinays in her class; in fact, there had never been one at Boalt Hall. In point of fact, before Eleanor, there had never ever been a Pinay at any law school in California, or perhaps in all of the United States. Eleanor had no Pinay role models to look up to in law. She was it.

When she graduated from law school and passed the bar in 1972, she was quickly hired as a Deputy Attorney General in the California Attorney General’s Office in Sacramento, probably the first Filipino to hold that post, certainly the first Pinay.

There were 32 Deputy Attorney Generals in her office, of which 30 were males, almost all were Caucasian. She quickly ascended the ranks and was appointed Administrative Law Judge to handle unemployment insurance cases. She rose to become Chief Judge in her department. By then, breaking glass ceilings and being the first was nothing new to Eleanor.

In 1981, when there was enough of a critical mass of Filipino attorneys in Northern California, Eleanor and a dozen of us organized the Filipino Bar Association of Northern California (FBANC). Although virtually all of us were men, there was no question that the one most qualified to lead us to become a professional organization was Eleanor. FBANC has had 26 presidents since then but Eleanor was the first.

After 35 years of working for the state of California, Eleanor quietly retired last week and was set to celebrate her retirement with her husband and her kids, all grown up, by going out to dinner all they way in San Francisco from their home in Oakland. On the way, they stopped by a friend’s retirement party in Oakland’s Chinatown.

It was not a friend’s retirement party, it was hers. A genuine surprise to Eleanor who saw all her family members, her fellow judges and old colleagues from the Attorney General’s office, some of whom flew in from Los Angeles, her FBANC and community friends all had been waiting to shower her with warmth and affection in a testimonial roast.

The surprise party was planned by Eleanor’s husband of 35 years, Mike Nisperos, whose role model was his wife. After graduating from high school in Oakland in 1968, Mike enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps and served two tours of duty in Vietnam. After completing his tour and finishing as a Master Sergeant, Mike returned to Oakland in 1971, where he met Eleanor, who was graduating from law school. After a brief courtship, Mike and Eleanor married and Mike went to college on his G.I. Bill, graduating from UC Berkeley in 1975 and then, following Eleanor’s lead, going on to Boalt Hall as well, graduating in 1978.

After working in the Oakland District Attorney’s Office as a Deputy DA, Mike worked in the Judge Advocate General’s Office from 1982-88 and then as an attorney in the then U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). In 1991, he was appointed “drug czar” of Oakland, as Director of the Mayor’s Office of Drugs and Crime, where he coordinated the enforcement, prevention and education efforts directed toward the reduction of crime and drug abuse. In 2001, Mike was appointed Chief Trial Counsel of the State Bar of California overseeing the bar’s attorney discipline system over the state’s 175,000 attorneys.

Mike was recently appointed Deputy Attorney General for the Marianas Islands to serve in Saipan, where he will be joined by his wife. They have two kids, Marlo, a Deputy District Attorney in Sonoma County, and Mike Jr., a law student at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento.

A role model is one who is compassionate and feels obligated to better “society” and work for the common good of the community; has developed powerful and effective habits of the mind and soul; can work through challenges and is committed to what he or she does; has the capacity to achieve goals and obtain self-fulfillment; possesses high standards and values; and is admired for courage and strength.
By all these standards, Eleanor Oducayen Nisperos fully fits the bill of a positive role model. And so does her husband, Mike. We wish them well in their new adventure in Saipan and we thank them both for lighting the path for the rest of us to follow. Godspeed.

Send comments to Rodel50@aol.com.