It was January 13, 2020, and Jessica Manuela Moore was parked on the side of the road in Modesto.
The father she barely knew, but had been caring for, had just died. Moore, then 48, was couch surfing and occasionally staying in a homeless shelter in Lodi. That afternoon, she sat in her car praying as her future darkened by the minute.
No family. No home. No food.
… Sign up for the Spring Semester at Merced College! Apply, enroll, get financial aid! Start your journey towards a new future! Counselors are standing by! There will be free food! …
The upbeat commercial coming from the car radio jolted Moore back to the present. She heard “free food,” started her car and pointed it toward Merced.
“It was right before COVID struck,” she said. “I arrived and they took care of me immediately. I got some food and they put me into a class that day. It was easier than I thought. And it saved my life.”
Moore is graduating May 24 with an associate transfer degree and a certificate in Ag Business. She will graduate with honors as a member of Phi Theta Kappa. Then she’ll attend Stanislaus State to work on a bachelor’s degree.
Her future now shimmers with possibility.
“My life is the best it has ever been,” she said. “After my BA, I might even get a master’s. No one in my family has ever gone to college. It’s a dream come true. I’m super excited and grateful for the community here. Merced College has helped me completely turn my life around.”
Moore has had to survive and adapt her entire life. She grew up with an alcoholic mother and a violent father, a veteran battling PTSD. She spent years in foster care, until she came of age and moved to Los Angeles to become a model and actress. (She still maintains her Screen Actors Guild membership.)
In her 30s, Moore attended DeVry University. But after earning a 4.0 her first semester, she dropped out when she couldn’t afford the tuition. DeVry blocked Moore from receiving any financial aid for another decade. But when DeVry lost a 2016 class action suit for misrepresenting potential job and salary possibilities, Moore was set free to start again.
She moved back to Modesto to be with her father. Though she didn’t know him well, she wanted a relationship with him. He was in poor health and suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. She had been caring for him for a year when he died of a heart attack, and Moore’s life came unglued again.
That took her to Merced College the first time. Still, two months later, COVID ended her part-time housecleaning job, and she was back living in her car by March. Moore had to find help again, except it was easier the second time around.
“I just figured, no matter what happens—death, homelessness, starvation, COVID—I’m going to finish,” Moore said.
She called the college for help and was connected with EOPS administrative assistant Himmelda Luna. Since Moore had been working before the pandemic, Luna told her she now qualified for unemployment.
The benefit allowed Moore to live in Sacramento, and the pandemic allowed her to continue her Merced College classes online. For 18 months, she attended virtual classes and dutifully punched in her assignments on her phone, snagging As and Bs along the way.
When the college reopened, Moore rushed back to Merced to take the honors classes she had earned the right to take and use other services like on-campus tutoring. Again, she had a tough start, arriving in Merced on Thanksgiving weekend with just $12 to her name.
But Luna knew her situation, and she drove to Moore’s new apartment to drop off a $150 grocery card, a basic needs benefit for all students in need.
To show her appreciation, Moore took Luna to her honors banquet in 2023. “Himmelda never gave up on me,” Moore said.
She has also been working at the campus food pantry since her return. Basic Needs Coordinator Shannon Gregg hired her, not knowing what a good omen it was.
Moore had come to the college for sustenance. Now she gives it to others. She looks into the eyes of fellow students and sees herself.
“I’m 52,” Moore said. “I used to think, ‘No one is going to care about me. I’m old and washed up.’ But everyone inspired me to get my life back.
“I used to pray to God to give me the strength to get to where I need to be in life. I wouldn’t be able to help others if I hadn’t lived those tragedies myself.”