A Home-Grown Scholar : He’s a straight-A student, an activist focused on the rights of farm workers, a son whose heroes are his parents. And, oh, yes, Juan De Lara is bound for Oxford.

Juan D. De Lara set himself apart as a 5-year-old kindergartener in Coachella. When the teacher put up a picture on the board on the first day of school, none of his shy classmates were brave enough to tell the class what the picture showed. But Juan, the son of migrant farm workers, stood up and announced, “That’s a tree with apples on it.”

De Lara, now a 21-year-old senior majoring in sociology at Pitzer College in Claremont, recently set himself apart again. One of 32 American college students chosen this month as Rhodes scholars, De Lara will begin studies at Oxford University in England in the summer.

The Southwest region Rhodes Scholar Committee, judging De Lara’s straight-A academic record and impressed with his vibrant background of activism, made him the first student from Pitzer College to win the prestigious award. “I didn’t think they’d be so receptive--I had a lot of passion,” De Lara said of his interview with the committee, during which he poured forth his views about his activism.

Slender and garrulous, De Lara favors wearing a black fedora over his long black hair. He lights up when conversation turns to his involvement in anti-Proposition 187 rallies and protecting the rights of immigrant laborers. “I see how my parents went through the same thing,” he said. But he admits he was a bit nervous about competing against some of the nation’s top students, one of whom included a letter of recommendation from a former Rhodes scholar--President Clinton--in his portfolio.

As his mother, Esperanza De Lara, relishes Juan’s accomplishments, she looks back on that day in kindergarten when her tiny son grabbed the spotlight as she sat in the back of the classroom, waiting to make sure he wouldn’t cry on his first day of school. “I knew my son had a future,” she said.

De Lara is one of eight children, the son of migrant workers who came to the United States from Mexico--his mother from the state of Aguas Calientes and his father from Zacatecas. Esperanza and Jose De Lara dragged the family from school to school for much of his childhood as they chased crop harvests. In high school, he spent his time outside the classroom picking grapes in the fields around Bakersfield. He said he’s gotten much of his inspiration from his parents: “The only heroes I have are my parents.”

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The Rhodes scholarship was created at the turn of the century by British philanthropist Cecil Rhodes, who sought to promote worldwide peace by bringing students from foreign countries to study at Oxford. Students receive free tuition for two years and a $22,000 stipend. Two other students from California, Malaika Marie Williams of Whittier College and Alvan Ikoku of Stanford University, also were chosen.

Nigel Boyle, a Pitzer College professor of political studies and former Oxford instructor who recommended De Lara, said that aside from grades, the Rhodes scholar committee traditionally has considered athletic involvement as a sign of leadership ability. In recent years, however, the committee has weighed student activism more heavily and has also pushed for more minority representation, Boyle said.

At Pitzer, De Lara has not been shy about making waves. He has helped organize hundreds of people for rallies in Southern California to protest Proposition 187, completed an internship with a labor union and participated in a sit-in to force the administration to keep a lunch program for campus janitors. He is still vehement in his opposition to Proposition 187, the measure that seeks to limit government services to undocumented immigrants--an issue that hits close to home. “It was an attack on immigrants,” he said.

To Pitzer College President Marilyn Chapin Massey, De Lara’s radical fire is reminiscent of those involved in the civil rights movement of the 1960s. “Juan’s someone who believes deeply in the causes of justice,” she said. “I see him following in the heritage of [farm worker activist] Cesar Chavez.”

Sociology professor Jose Calderon said De Lara has become the campus voice of the oppressed. “Juan epitomizes [getting involved],” he said. “A lot of us who came from farm worker backgrounds try to go back and better our community.”

In some instances, De Lara’s activism has become contagious. “He introduced me to a lot of issues,” said Aaron Balkan, an American studies sophomore who first heard De Lara speak on behalf of the school’s janitors at an administration meeting, and who later participated in rallies organized by De Lara.

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De Lara’s award has been cause for celebration in his hometown. At Coachella Valley Union High School, where De Lara graduated in 1991, Principal Alex Franco said the new Rhodes scholar has brought honor to the school. “It’s a feather in our cap,” he said. “Everybody around here feels they played a part.”

Manuel Mercado, a Pitzer College psychology major who went to high school with De Lara, said his longtime friend is a bright spot in a community where too many of their peers have fallen by the wayside: Most haven’t gone to college, and others have started out but dropped out.

Going from Claremont to Oxford will be culture shock for De Lara, Boyle said. At a school where students often wear tuxedos to dinner, “Juan may be the only one that doesn’t wear a tie already,” he said.

But his dress code is probably not the only difference in De Lara’s background. As a child, after years of wandering from California to Washington state, his parents finally settled the family in the Coachella Valley in east Riverside County, where De Lara started middle school. The family packed up during the summer months, when they traveled to work camps in the San Joaquin Valley, where De Lara picked grapes alongside his parents. “That’s what I had to do to survive,” he says.

Although he says he wasn’t particularly studious while at Coachella Valley, teachers and friends there remember him as a serious student with the potential to do well. He graduated with a 3.1 grade-point average and entered expensive Pitzer on financial assistance.

Unsure what he will study at Oxford, De Lara said he will continue to fight for the politically underrepresented by organizing communities when he returns to the United States. “We need to address issues of power and wealth,” he said.

For De Lara’s parents, both of whom quit elementary school to labor in the fields, their son’s future looks sweet. “One day he’s going to do something for our people,” his mother said, beginning to weep.