Brother duo at Mesa Community College impact campus with maintenance operations
Alonzo and Bert Begay work for the maintenance and operations department of Mesa Community College and positively impact many faculty and students with their work.
The Begays, two brothers from the Navajo Nation, began working at MCC in the mid-2010s.
Alonzo Begay, the older of the two brothers, began working at MCC in 2012 after formerly being a student at the college. Alonzo said he worked his way to a full time position, which began in 2017.
“I wanted to get my associate’s in criminal justice, and I needed a job, so I got referred to the maintenance department. I got started working as a custodian there,” said Alonzo.
Bert worked in retail for two years prior to getting a part time position working within the maintenance department. According to Bert, he began working full time two years ago in 2022.
The brothers respond to a wide variety of work orders including electrical, plumbing and manual labor work around the college.
Tasks include setting up decorations around the college, including the american flags placed in front of the library, setting up furniture, wiring lights or other electronics in classrooms, carpentry to fix room damage, setting up equipment for extra curricular events on campus, and much more.
According to the brothers, neither had much property maintenance experience, however, both credit their superiors within the department for teaching them over the years.
“As the years went on, I became more proficient in a lot of the skills I had to do,” said Alonzo.
“I had no experience with this type of work going into it, but you learn pretty quickly, actually,” said Bert.
The brothers named Paul McDermott, maintenance operations technician at MCC, as someone who has taught them an instrumental amount during their time at MCC.
The two had the opportunity to learn more general trade skills as administrative changes occurred at the college and other staff members, some of whom no longer worked at MCC.
“Your position starts to become less and less specialized, and now it’s becoming more of a jack of all trades [position],” said Alonzo.
The brothers also noted an appreciation for the opportunity to learn life skills through their jobs within the maintenance department. The two take their skills back home to the Navajo Nation.
“What we learn here, we can take back home as well. Whenever we go back home to see our mom, she’s like ‘Alright well, you know the drill, it’s time to get to work’,” said Alonzo.
The brothers also felt pride for the Navajo Room in particular, a room located at the center of campus near the clocktower, which is often used as a space for events on campus.
“It reminds us a little bit of home [with] the events, it even hosted some of the powwows. It’s just pretty cool,” said Bert.
Sergio Ybanez, facilities director at MCC, noted an instance where the brothers went above and beyond in order to help students on campus.
“Both brothers assisted the Japanese linguistic school here at our college with a major event set up that was missed. Both Alonzo and Bert sacrificed their Saturday day off to come in and work with the school to get their exact event layout and setup needs taken care of so the event could take place,” said Ybanez.
Their overall attitude and helpfulness with any needs of students or faculty at MCC are what make them even more valuable than just their job description, according to Ybanez
