On the day her adoption was finalized, Allana Martinez remembers being handed a small orange teddy bear in a courtroom, a child-sized symbol of permanence after an uncertain start.
The Covina native was about 3 1/2 years old when she was adopted by her paternal grandmother and her husband after spending time in kinship care and foster care. Those cumulative experiences, she says, continued shaping her long after the adoption was finalized.
“It’s a blessing to have an open adoption and know your [biological parents],” Martinez said. “But it also can be extremely difficult, because you grow up witnessing their struggles.”
At UCLA, Martinez found a way to channel those experiences into purpose. The graduating senior and psychobiology major credits much of that growth to UCLA’s Bruin Guardian Scholars program, or BGS.
Founded in 2009 through student advocacy efforts, the program provides financial assistance, mentorship, housing guidance, internships and community-building events for students who have experienced system involvement for any length of time. That can be foster care, kinship care, homelessness or other such touch points to the system.
But for Martinez, the greatest impact was something less tangible.
“BGS has just allowed me to make that a proud part of my identity,” she said. “It’s given me community, and it’s allowed me to reclaim my story in that way.”
‘Imposter syndrome’ and initial hesitation
Martinez arrived at UCLA in 2022 and, like many incoming students, received emails introducing campus support programs, including one suggesting she might qualify for BGS.
At first, she dismissed it.
“When I saw it, I kind of belittled my experiences,” Martinez said. “I was like: ‘This isn’t for me. This is for kids who have aged out. They need these resources.’”
That hesitation, she later realized, stemmed from years of minimizing her own story.
“I think even within communities like this, there’s imposter syndrome,” she said. “It’s like I don’t think my experiences are as valid as the next person’s.”
Everything changed during her first year in UCLA housing, when a floormate within her Chicanx/Latinx Living Learning Community shared that he, too, had spent time in foster care, and encouraged her to apply. Martinez eventually did, navigating documentation hurdles that she says can delay support for students trying to prove eligibility. In Martinez’s experience, tracking down adoption-era records through Los Angeles County became a lengthy process requiring the information to be pulled from microfilm. Then there were the retrieval fees, which can be an additional barrier, especially as a student.
“Once you’re in the system, it kicks you down,” she said. “They never made it easy for you.”
After joining BGS, though, Martinez quickly became immersed in the community. She spent so much of her time in the program’s space within the Bruin Resource Center that she jokingly referred to her herself as an “honorary intern” long before officially joining the staff this year.
Within the role, Martinez has helped fellow students navigate everything from housing questions to job applications and campus resources.
“I’m glad I can finally give back in the way that they had to me,” she said.
The support she received through BGS was both practical and deeply personal. Emergency scholarships helped her cover rent and utilities while living off campus, while professional development funding paid for her phlebotomy certification and graduate school preparation materials. The program also helped cover textbooks and provided community meals during stressful academic periods.
“BGS will always feed you,” Martinez said with a laugh. “We always say that: We will try to feed you no matter what.”
Holiday-centered events became especially meaningful for many students who could not always return home during school breaks. BGS also hosts move-in events that provide students with dorm essentials ranging from comforters to toiletries and school supplies.
A ‘full-circle moment’
Outside the classroom, Martinez built a college experience rooted in service and advocacy.
Through UCLA’s student-run Pre-medical Undergraduate Learning through Shadowing Experience program, or PULSE, she shadowed physicians at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center while conducting research presentations exploring the social and emotional dimensions of patient care.
One of her patient presentations highlighted the ways symptoms and care needs can sometimes be overlooked because of systemic barriers and instability at home. The opportunity allowed her to connect academic research with her own lived experiences.
“Students like me — some foster youth don’t even make it to college,” Martinez said. “So to be here, to be in that space, it’s beyond words.”
She spent three years working for Jumpstart, an AmeriCorps-affiliated early childhood literacy program serving under-resourced schools and communities across Los Angeles County. Martinez commuted as far as Koreatown weekly by bus to work with preschool-age children, eventually rising into leadership positions within the program before it was discontinued amid broader funding changes.
Martinez has also worked as a peer mentor with UCLA TIES for Families since 2023, directly supporting system-impacted youth by connecting them with community and resources and providing emotional and academic support.
These experiences reinforced her desire to pursue work focused on care, equity and systems support. This spring, Martinez was accepted into Azusa Pacific University’s master of social work program, where she will attend on a full-ride scholarship through the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services Child Welfare Stipend Program. She is one of six incoming students to join the program’s cohort.
“It’s a very full-circle moment,” she said. “There’s so much work to be done.”
Originally interested in medical school, Martinez now hopes to become a medical social worker, potentially working with foster youth and families navigating the same systems that shaped her own childhood.
As she prepares to graduate, Martinez hopes students with similar experiences will recognize themselves in programs like Bruin Guardian Scholars.
“BGS is for you,” she said. “If any eligibility requirements even barely apply to you, meet with our staff.”
The little orange courtroom teddy bear still sits among her belongings today. It serves as a reminder of how far she has come, from a child moving through the foster care system to a graduating Bruin preparing to help other young people navigate systems of care themselves.
