Nursing Graduate Welcomes Twins a Few Months Before Graduation
Elvia Vargas received unexpected news just as she was entering the most rigorous stretch of her nursing degree program—news that might have derailed any other student.
Last summer, she learned she was pregnant with twins. But after years of balancing a cleaning business, science prerequisites, clinical training, and raising her children, she kept going.
This month she will make the trip from her Pennsauken home before dawn to SHI Stadium in Piscataway to attend Commencement 2026 celebrating her graduation from the Rutgers School of Nursing’s 2+2 Bachelor of Science in Nursing program in Blackwood.
"I'm really proud of this moment,’’ Vargas said. “This achievement reflects the strength, patience, and determination it took to never give up. El que persevera alcanza/those who persevere succeed.”
The twins, Victoria and Valentina, were born on February 12. By mid-March, just weeks after a C-section, Vargas was back in her clinical rotations, determined to finish on schedule.
Her instructor, Vanessa Lugo, watched her student with awe, noting that many others would have stepped away.
“What impressed me most was her thoughtful decision to continue, fully aware of the physical challenges,” Lugo said. “No matter what was happening, she showed up focused and ready to care for her patients. That consistency makes a strong nurse.”
The resilience Lugo witnessed was forged long before Vargas entered a hospital room. While taking a science course in her native Colombia, she found herself drawn to the human side of health care. She believed nursing was her future, but she chose a different kind of education first: working in the United States.
At 20, she arrived in Berlin, N.J., as an au pair with only a few words of English. Her host mother helped her learn the language through daily routines.
“She did a great job teaching me how to read and write,” Vargas recalled. “She wrote down everything I had to do during the day, and I learned quickly.”
Vargas remained in New Jersey after the program, raising a son, Amir, as a single mother and eventually became a U.S. citizen. She supported her family by launching a cleaning business and working as a companion to older adults.
“I really loved working with them,” she said. “I wanted to care for them the way I would want someone to care for my parents, who are in Colombia and aging.”
In 2019, Vargas enrolled at Camden County College to begin her science prerequisites. Around that time, her life took another turn: she met Luis Martinez.
Vargas had moved in with a roommate named Brenda, Martinez’s mother, and a friendship with Luis grew into a partnership. They soon welcomed a daughter, Amaia, now 6.
Martinez, who grew up in Puerto Rico, had been a college baseball player before finding his calling in health care. While Martinez was working as a custodian in a surgical center, a physician with whom he'd become friendly challenged his trajectory. 'Ten years will pass either way,' he recalled the doctor saying. 'It's up to you what you do with them.' That hit me."
That became a turning point for Vargas and Martinez and they decided to pursue their nursing degrees at Rutgers. With two young children, they decided to stagger their enrollment with Martinez starting first and Vargas following a year later. Martinez, who served as campus president in the nursing school’s student senate, graduated last year and now works as a registered nurse in the gastroenterology ICU at Cooper University Health Care.
Now, its Vargas’s turn to graduate, and with their new set of twins.
“The program prepared us well,” Martinez said. “The clinical experience makes you feel like a nurse. You’ve already seen a lot before you start the job.”
The strength of the couple’s partnership allowed Vargas to return to her clinical rotations on the hospital floor just weeks after the twins were born. On the oncology unit, her life experiences and fluency in Spanish helped her build trust with patients and families facing terminal diagnoses, especially those who English was limited.
“When patients talk to you, they can sense if you understand what they’re going through,” she said. “I know I have the heart for this.”
Graduation marks two additional milestones for Vargas: her degree and her 40th birthday. She is now focused on taking the NCLEX exam this summer to become a licensed registered nurse. She plans to wait until the twins are a year old before starting her first hospital role.
For Vargas, the bachelor’s degree is a message to her four children about persistence. “I always believed I could do more,” she said. “Even when it was hard, I kept going.”
Martinez, who took paternity leave to help Vargas reach the finish line, watched her manage it all.
“Everything she handled at once – school, pregnancy, the kids – it’s a lot,” Martinez said. “And she did it.”
