Sharon Gordon, interim director of Experiential Learning, shies away from congratulatory remarks made to her about being honored with a 2007 Governor’s Award for Outstanding New Mexico Women.

“I’m just a soccer mom,” she says. But that’s only if you don’t know the whole story.

Her e-mails include a quote from World War II General George Patton – “Success is how you land when you hit the ground.”

Gordon admits she’s hit the ground a few times. She graduated from what was then TVI in 1983 with a nursing degree and spent 20 years in the field, the last nine as an emergency room nurse.

When her 11-year-old son wanted a go-kart, Gordon decided she could build one herself and enrolled in welding classes at TVI.

“It’s a running joke that I like to play with fire,” she says.

Her home situation turned ugly and she found herself on her own with an 11-year-old son and $200 to her name. Gordon persisted with classes and became involved in SkillsUSA. In 2001, the CNM Foundation asked her to speak at its annual donor dinner and presented her with a check for $300.

“That $300 about saved my life,” she says.

The encouragement she received at the College kept her going. “It wasn’t that they told me I couldn’t do it,” she says. “It was they told me I could do it. It’s what motivated me.”

Upon earning her certificate, Sandia National Laboratories offered her a job as an intern machinist. There, she met her fiancé, Carl, a leather clad, motorcycle enthusiast with a long white beard and a soft heart. Fifty-nine days before their wedding Carl was killed on his motorcycle on I-25.

Gordon says she found herself having to choose between working at Sandia or TVI after graduation to support herself and her son. She says former director of Experiential Learning Rudy Garcia, who was recruiting her to work in the service learning program, told her he understood the decision she had to make. But he said, “We’ll be your family.” He lived up to the promise, she says.

“He pushed the hell out of me,” she says of Garcia, now the dean of students “He sets high standards and expectations, but the cool thing about Rudy is he gives you the tools to do it. He celebrates good things. He comforts bad things.”

Garcia says Gordon’s life experience makes her a mentor for students. In his letter to the award nomination committee he wrote, “(Awards) should be given to individuals who have every right to give up on life, but continue knowing that the end of the rainbow is near for their children and themselves. She accepts and respects all persons for who they are. Students recognize this and associate well with her because they understand that she has lived their struggles. They understand that she has had their fears.”

And once again she understands what it’s like to balance work and a college schedule. Her desk holds a coffee cup and a Diet Coke to push her through her busy schedule. She’s pursuing a bachelor’s degree in organizational psychology at the College of Santa Fe. She’ll graduate in May and then take the summer off from her studies before she dives into a master’s program.

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” she says.

For now the soccer mom is giving her 19-year-old son, Seth, advice over e-mail. A CNM student, he’s working at Walt Disney World and will return to classes in the fall. He’s the cover boy for CNM’s summer Schedule of Classes.

Gordon is great at balancing life and work, but she says she’s no different from anyone else. There are days when she remembers what she’s lost.

“There are days I want to crawl under my desk and eat crayons,” she says. Instead she pushes on and opens her door to the students who need her.