Freddie Rios Barrientos has spent all four years of his high school career here at Glendale High School, and he is finally nearing the end of his senior year. He was born in Tijuana, Mexico in 2006 and would eventually move to Glendale, California as a child. Some of his favorite things to do are playing football and listening to music. Freddie is a captain on the GHS varsity football team, and he was recently a Semi-Finalist for the 2024 Pat Navolanic Memorial Award.

Freddie was fortunate enough to be raised in Glendale, where he can be close to his family. However, life as a child wasn’t so easy for him. “I was raised by a single mother for most of my life, and it was always just the two of us,” he said. This would bring financial hardship on his family, but this only drove him further.

Someone who has always been there for Freddie is his mother. He said, “My mom is the person who’s supported me the most in every single way. Everything I do is for my mom, and everything I am is for my mom.”

As soon as Freddie got into high school, he joined our football team and would play four years on the varsity squad. He then became the head captain of the team for the 2023-2024 season, leading them to their first winning season in over a decade. 

Football is also Freddie’s favorite part about his high school career, where he feels that he has made “brothers for life.” Playing football has also taught Freddie important values, like discipline, respect, integrity, grit, communication and brotherhood.

Aside from football, Freddie is heavily involved with other school activities. He is both a part of the American Cancer Society and STAR Club, (which stands for Students Together Assisting Refugees). Not only that, but he has achieved an impressive 4.8 GPA during his senior year, and an overall high school GPA of 4.4. Freddie believes that he has had some help along the way from our teachers, especially Mr. and Mrs. Keefer, Mr. O’Malley, Ms. Sukazian and Senora Sepulveda.

With all of these accomplishments under his belt, Freddie applied to many of the top universities out there, including UC Irvine, UC Berkeley, Stanford, Harvard, UCLA, and Yale. Many of the schools accepted him, and although he originally planned to go to his dream school of UCLA, he got accepted into Yale and will be heading there this fall.

Freddie is the perfect example of what hard work can get you in life, and Yale will benefit from the leadership skills that he has developed through his high school experience here in Glendale. We wish Freddie all the best, and we can’t wait to see what the future holds for him.