From Montserrat to America: Patrice Onwuka’s Story of Opportunity
Our American Stories
iHeartPodcasts
4.6 • 817 Ratings
🗓️ 28 May 2026
⏱️ 20 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On this episode of Our American Stories, Patrice Onwuka was born on the Caribbean island of Montserrat before her family immigrated legally to the United States in search of greater opportunity. After arriving in a rough neighborhood outside Boston during the 1980s, Onwuka watched her parents work exhausting jobs, sacrifice endlessly for their children, and slowly build a new life from scratch.
Years later, the little girl who grew up watching political commentary shows with her parents became one of the voices she once saw on television. Onwuka shares her story of immigration, hard work, education, and the American Dream.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
| 0:02.6 | Guaranteed Human. |
| 0:16.1 | And we return to our American stories. |
| 0:19.6 | Up next, a story from our true diversity series |
| 0:22.2 | sponsored by the great folks at Philanthropy Roundtable, America's leading advocate for your |
| 0:27.3 | freedom to support the causes you believe in. Their true diversity initiative encourages |
| 0:32.6 | Americans to embrace all the qualities that make us unique individuals, because there's so much more to each of our stories |
| 0:39.8 | than what's defined by a group identity or other superficial traits. |
| 0:45.0 | Today, we meet a partner of their campaign, Patrice on Wuka. |
| 0:50.5 | Take it away, Patrice. |
| 0:51.8 | My story starts back in the Caribbean. |
| 0:55.0 | I was born in the tiny island called Montserrat. I was born in the tiny island called Montserrat. |
| 0:58.0 | For the most part, most people work in some shape or form in a way that is, you know, connected to the government. |
| 1:05.0 | And even more difficult for people is that if you are not connected, if you are not wealthy already, |
| 1:14.7 | the likelihood of your children being able to go to college, go to graduate school, really |
| 1:20.6 | achieve beyond what you yourself as an adult is doing, you know, it's very small. And my parents, they were not connected, they were not wealthy, |
| 1:31.3 | and they recognized that, you know, for us, their children |
| 1:34.3 | to be able to achieve greater things, |
| 1:37.3 | it was not going to happen in this tiny parochial island of Munserra. |
| 1:42.3 | That's why they decided to move to the United States where there |
| 1:45.3 | would be so much more opportunity for them. So they filed for us to come to this country |
| 1:52.9 | and my parents went through the entire legal process. It was expensive. It was very long, |
... |
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