‘This is going to take some getting used to’

MOSES LAKE — Nallely Escobedo said she didn’t realize for a long time that her vision wasn’t really that good.

“I thought everyone just saw how I saw,” she said.

Her family didn’t have a way to get her what she needed, she said. So Escobedo now a records clerk and recruiter with the Moses Lake School District migrant program, decided to see if there was a way to ensure students in the migrant program didn’t have the same experience.

Escobedo eventually realized other students didn’t have the same trouble she did, she said - they could see what was written on the board from the back of the classroom. But recognizing the problem didn’t solve it.

“One day I (said), ‘Mom, I think I need glasses.’ She told me that was out of the question,” Escobedo said.

Her mom was a single mother, raising two children and battling illness. Money was tight.

“We just couldn’t afford it. So she would tell me, ‘Sit closer to the board. Ask your friends. Do anything you can to not have to spend money.’ So we just never did it,” she said. “Time passed. Years passed.”

Escobedo spent part of her childhood in Colorado and returned to Colorado from Mexico when she was 17 years of age. She wanted to finish school, she said, and she wanted to help her mom.

“I started working a lot. If I wasn’t at school, I was at work,” she said.

She put in the hours at a fast-food restaurant and was making what she thought was pretty good money, she said, enabling her to help her mom and get some things for herself. She transferred to a restaurant in the same chain when she moved to Moses Lake. And with that first paycheck, she decided to do something about her vision.

“My first check here I (said), ‘Okay, I’m going to get my eyes checked,’” she said.

She went to the Vision Center housed in the Moses Lake Walmart. The Vision Center is part of the National Vision chain and the company partners with Walmart in Moses Lake. She talked with a licensed dispensing optician, Eva Jones.

“And she said, ‘Do you have insurance?’ I said, ‘Absolutely not.’ And she said, ‘Okay, let’s figure this out.’ One pair of glasses cost me $387, I think,” Escobedo said.

Those glasses were a revelation.

“It wasn’t anything crazy or tinted, or the transition (lenses). Nothing. It was just the basics, but it was so cool. I got to see everything and I didn’t have to squint. I could read from far away,” she said.

Escobedo came up with her own description for the difference.

“I was able to see in 4K,” she said.

She went to work for the school district, first as classroom support at Sage Point Elementary.

“I loved my job. I loved my kids. But I really felt like I was getting too comfortable. I wanted to do more,” she said.

She applied for a job with the MLSD migrant program and got it on the second try. The just-finished school year was her first, and she was working with a new director, Karen Schotzko.

Being new to the job meant they had to explore.

“We didn’t know what we didn’t couldn’t do,” Schotzko said.

“So we would just ask questions all the time,” Escobedo said.

And among the questions that came up were eyeglasses for students in the migrant program.

“Usually we do physicals for our kids. This year, after running some numbers I didn’t see an extremely high need for physicals,” Escobedo said. “So we had some money from our budget allocated to health services that weren’t going to be used if we didn’t do physicals. So I said, ‘Hey, what do you think about glasses?’”

All MLSD students got a vision screening during the 2021-22 school year. The results showed about 125 students in the migrant program needed help with their vision, Escobedo said. So she consulted with her friend Eva Jones and asked if maybe, possibly, the Vision Center could help those students get glasses.

“She told me, ‘Nallely, I think this is doable. Let me talk to my supervisors, and I’ll get back to you.’ And I don’t think it took her very long, maybe a day or two, and she called me back. And she said they absolutely love the idea,” Escobedo said.

“A significant portion of our migrant grant always goes to health care,” Schtozko said. “And as far as I know, no one in the state has ever done vision.

“So this is going to change the trajectory for a lot of kids,” she said. “Now they’re going to be able to access the content that much easier, instead of having to ask their friends and get in trouble for talking in class, or ask to sit close to the board.”

Vision professionals from the Vision Center did the eye exams, one doctor the first and two the second day, Escobedo said.

“We had people come from California, just for this event,” she said.

And the Vision Center contributed in another crucial way.

“The migrant budget only covered 105 students,” Escobedo said. “And the Vision Center kicked in, and they are covering all the costs for the remaining 20 students.”

The new glasses made a difference, sometimes a big difference, she said. A Larson Heights student kept taking her new glasses on and off, astonished at what she was seeing.

“She would say, ‘Without my glasses, I can’t even see that price (tag) right there. And then I put them on, and I can see the price.’ And as soon as we walked outside, she (said) ‘Whoa. This is amazing.’ When we were driving her back to Larson Heights, all I hear her say is, ‘This is going to take some getting used to. Everything is just so clear,’” Escobedo said.

A high school student was worried something was very wrong with her, Escobedo said, but doctors discovered during her exam that one eye was very poor. The new glasses might make a lifelong difference.

“(The vision professional) told her, ‘You need to wear your glasses. Your good eye is compensating for your bad eye, but your bad eye is so bad that it’s going to stop working,’” she said.

Schotzko said she and Escobedo plan to keep looking for ways to help children and families in the migrant program. She’s looking forward to next year, and the years after that.

“What’s (the migrant program) going to look like in five years?” Schotzko said.

Cheryl Schweizer may be reached at cschweizer@columbiabasinherald.com.