In 1996, accompanied by her three children, Mariana Vergara immigrated to the United States. At the time, she was an ESL student at County College of Morris, N.J. With what she learned as a student, she set as her career goal to reach out and help people pursue higher education. By 1998, she was able to recruit other Latino students to further the implementation of this life-long commitment. Her early volunteer efforts were the prelude to the establishment of Family Development Center (FDC) in 2001, with the support of the WKBJ Foundation. FDC opened its office with the objective to assist the Hispanic community to pursue higher education. To that end, FDC counseled and provided scholarships to one hundred minority students, all of whom volunteered at 25 agencies in Morris County as part of the program. From those students, 70 graduated in 2008 and the other 30 graduated by 2009.

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