The boy from the barrio sat alone...

The boy from the barrio sat alone at a wooden table, fist curled around a pencil, shoulders hunched over a form. The questions were daunting: Household income, personal income. The boy tackled them, one by one.

His name was Sergio Rivas, and he was 17, and with some prodding, he told his tale. He was a senior here at East L.A.’s hallowed Garfield High School, and last summer, an amazing thing happened: A school counselor persuaded him, Sergio, to apply to Yale.

This was amazing for a number of reasons, not the least being that the counselor must spread her attention among hundreds of kids. Her name was Julie Neilson, and she admits that, at first, she hardly noticed the quiet boy with the tuft of dark whiskers on his chin.

It wasn’t until last summer, plowing through the files of the incoming seniors, that she glanced at Sergio’s grades and did a double-take: Member of the track team; A average; a healthy 1,240 on his SATs. She called him in. And this, too, amazed him. Because in the every-man-for-himself minefield that, in California, is now the race for college, Sergio Rivas didn’t expect any breaks.

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This month, the admission letters went out to teenagers across the nation. “Congratulations!” they began. Or, “We regret . . . “ College in the ‘90s has become heartbreakingly important, as crucial as a high school diploma used to be.

In the aftermath of California’s breaks-altering Proposition 209, this season of letters has been a particular ordeal. From the top University of California campuses, the “congratulations” now flow less freely for kids like Sergio.

Once, the UC system was a slam-dunk for working-class strivers. Some would say it was built for them, in fact. But now the deck is being restacked, and increasingly, the edge goes to those with the confidence and money to consult experts/tutors, sign up for SAT workshops and hire private consultants who’ll guide and “market” a kid.

You might expect the breach to be filled by high school guidance counselors. You’d be counseled to expect again. In public schools, here and nationally, the ratio of students to advisors is 400 to 1, on average. Breach-filling, they’ll tell you, is out of the question. It’s “Let the triage begin.”

Take Neilson. As Garfield’s college counselor, her job is to make sure every student is informed about the options for college and that those interested in college get the guidance they need. That’s in theory. In practice, she is the sole source of college advice for 731 graduating seniors and hundreds more underclassmen, and if she worked seven days a week, she couldn’t fit each child in.

So she holds big informational sessions for the masses and then singles out a few hundred for her individual time. She gives to the ones who ask for it, to the ones sent to her and the ones who, like Sergio, come to her attention by the sheer promise of their minds.

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“It was one of my ultimate goals to go to college. My parents never had the chance. They came from Mexico, from Torreon, Coahuila. My dad works construction. College would have changed everything for them.”

Sergio’s voice is a lilting murmur as he tells the story that could be the story of any child of any immigrant in any quarter of Greater L.A.: The yellow rented house with its single bedroom for six people. The crime and confusion. The all-nighters at the kitchen table because he had to wait until everyone was asleep just to get some quiet.

“I want to be an engineer,” he said. “But I thought that college was only for, like, the top students.” So he took every honors course--calculus, history, Spanish lit. A kid like him had to ace everything, he figured; otherwise, forget about it.

His goal was modest: the UC schools and Cal State. That way, if he didn’t get a scholarship, at least he could live at home and pay his way, work part time. When Neilson looked at his file and said, “Ivy League,” he said, “I was, like, dumbfounded. I thought I must not have heard her right.”

But she tackled his objections, one by one. And eventually, he applied. And last week, Sergio Rivas, the boy from the barrio, got a letter from Yale University. Congratulations, it said. Full scholarship. Free ride.

So now, he’s spending his lunch breaks in Neilson’s cluttered office, filling out financial aid paperwork. He is a victory, one of many being celebrated this month by triage workers like Neilson in this, the battle for the breaks.

But he is also a reminder of all the others who need mentors, who deserve more than ratios of 400 to 1. No one’s child should be left alone at the table. All deserve a guiding light.

Shawn Hubler’s e-mail address is shawn.hubler@latimes.com.