"One Family's Graduation Day Story: 5 Kids, 5 Harvard Grads"

Newsday (New York), June 7, 2001

Rose Chavez doesn't remember ever sitting down with her husband Ray and talking about how they were going to raise their kids. They just knew that their children would be educated. On the wrong side of the tracks in Albuquerque, where the disparity between Hispanics and "Anglos" was palpable, a plan like that meant a lot of hard work and sacrifice.

This spring, as Associated Press reporter Jerry Schwartz learned, the last of Ray and Rose's five kids graduated from Harvard—just like the four before her. As if that weren't enough, their living room is dominated by a Steinway grand piano that cost Rose the $10,000 she had in a retirement account from years in a civilian job with the Air Force.

To Rose, it was a no-brainer. "They were so good. They deserved a Steinway. That's the way I thought," she said.

Pushed and prodded by their parents, Marty, Rick, Tom, Andrea and Elena Chavez (in that order) excelled not only in music but in scholastic journalism (four were editors of the local school newspaper) and in their schoolwork. And one after another, they were admitted to America's most prominent university. University officials say larger groups of siblings have attended Harvard in its 365-year history, but it is hard to imagine a family that worked harder or sacrificed more to do it.

With the help of phonics records, Rose taught her children to read before kindergarten, Schwartz reports. "If you know how to read when you go to school, you never fall behind," Ray says. And with the help of something called Cycle Teacher—printed disks that rotate to ask and answer questions—they were drilled on history and science and other subjects.

As hard as their parents worked for them, the kids had to work too, and music practice was part of the regimen. Rick played the classical guitar, Andrea the violin, Marty, Tom and Elena the piano. There was little room for frivolity. "I literally missed out on 20 years of pop culture," Elena says. "I don't know movies. I don't know TV. I don't know actors."

Through the years, the family mortgaged its house over and over. Ray cut the kids' hair—and knew only one style, for boys and girls alike. The kids rode the bus while their friends were getting cars. Ray and Rose never added up how much it cost to put five kids through private high school and then Harvard, but they've made it clear: that was your inheritance. And each of the kids has put it to good use.

Marty went on to Stanford, for a combined Ph.D./M.D. program, and is now the founder and chief executive of Kiodex, a company that offers financial risk-management software. Rick lives in Boston, and has run two established companies and three start-ups, most recently Lobby7, a wireless software provider. Tom got his doctorate from Stanford, and is founder and CEO of Rapt, a San Francisco-based company that provides technology to help companies manage pricing, inventory and supply. Andrea went to Stanford and got a law degree and a Master's in computer science. She is vice president for business development at Mediabolic, a software company that focuses on entertainment and media applications for the home.

Elena, the recent grad, envisions a career in public policy and plans to move back to Albuquerque to be near her mom and dad. Ray is 67 and semi-retired, working part-time for a Honda dealership; Rose is 61, an administrative staff associate at Sandia Labs. She will not retire until she can afford it, and considering all the money that went to the Academy and Harvard—Rose says she's never toted it up—she may not retire for some time.

For the time being, though, Rose and Ray tool around Albuquerque in a shiny, black Volkswagen Beetle, a gift of Andrea Chavez, Harvard class of 1993. You can guess which school's crimson decal is in the rear window.

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