{"id":51001,"date":"2025-05-13T09:20:41","date_gmt":"2025-05-13T14:20:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/?p=51001"},"modified":"2025-05-13T09:20:43","modified_gmt":"2025-05-13T14:20:43","slug":"journey-through-asl-meet-dana-crouse-garza-acc-spring-graduate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/2025\/05\/13\/journey-through-asl-meet-dana-crouse-garza-acc-spring-graduate\/","title":{"rendered":"Journey Through ASL | Meet Dana Crouse-Garza, ACC spring graduate"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Austin Community College District (ACC) celebrates more than 3,300 graduates at its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.austincc.edu\/students\/graduation\/commencement-graduation-ceremony\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">spring 2025 commencement ceremony<\/a>. Friends and family are invited to congratulate students at the H-E-B Center in Cedar Park on Friday, May 16.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dana Crouse-Garza&#8217;s road to graduation has been anything but traditional. Starting at ACC in fall 2023, she balanced a full-time job with part-time studies. Now, she\u2019s getting ready to complete the College\u2019s American Sign Language Studies Level 1 Certificate in May 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cMy ASL journey has been both unique and challenging,\u201d says Dana. \u201cI work full time and take one class at a time. My educational journey is ongoing and will take a bit longer than most, but I\u2019m deeply committed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dana currently works as a Deaf Support Specialist at a local high school and is proud to be pursuing her goals in her 50s.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cLearning is lifelong, and age is never a barrier. Thank you to everyone who continues to support me on this path,\u201d she says. \u201cI started at ACC because of its reputable ASLIT program. I am grateful for the ASL lab and professors who support me along the way.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dana describes the feeling of getting ready to graduate as simply\u2014but appropriately\u2014\u201cAccomplished.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Up next, she plans to continue her interpreter training and work toward a degree. Her advice to other students:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cDo it. Don\u2019t let any excuse stop you. Even if you take just one class a semester, you\u2019re still moving forward towards your goal.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Austin Community College District (ACC) celebrates more than 3,300 graduates at its spring 2025 commencement ceremony. Friends and family are invited to congratulate students at the H-E-B Center in Cedar Park on Friday, May 16. Dana Crouse-Garza&#8217;s road to graduation has been anything but traditional. Starting at ACC in fall 2023, she balanced a full-time [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":103,"featured_media":51002,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[385,1004,1121,1122],"class_list":["post-51001","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-student-stories","tag-american-sign-language","tag-congrats-grads","tag-spring-2025-commencement","tag-spring-2025-graduation","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/103"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51001\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}