Posted on March 26, 2025 by Sean M. Wood
Tiffany Gillmore, wearing a graduation cap and gown, smiles while holding her young son.
Tiffany Gillmore has a difficult road to her engineering degree.
Electrical engineering courses alone are demanding. However, Gillmore found chemistry so enjoyable that she petitioned to double major in electrical AND chemical engineering. She is also a single mom raising a toddler.
“Going back to school and having a kid is not easy,” Gillmore said.
However, she is thriving with help from her mom, understanding professors, and a renewable $15,000 annual scholarship. “When I first went back to school, to Lone Star College, I had to take my son to class with me,” Gillmore said. “Their understanding was a blessing.”
She attends UTSA on the Lone Star College Scholarship, which is for STEM students who transfer to UTSA and pursue a science degree. Gillmore said the $15,000 renewable scholarship covers tuition and housing, so she doesn’t have to work.
“My mom drives in from Houston and stays Monday through Wednesday to help me with my son,” she said. “If she’s sick or can’t make it, I may have to take him to class. So far, I haven’t had a professor tell me, ‘No.’ One professor even told me to bring him more often.”
Gillmore returned to school when her son was 3 months old and said he has been at her side through most of her studies. “I tried to take more online classes when he was an infant, and he wouldn’t let me watch the courses unless he was with me,” she said. “So, together, we sat through videos of Calculus III.” He insists on watching YouTube videos of “mommy’s school” when she studies.
“We went to Six Flags recently, and I put him on the carousel, and he hated it until he looked up and saw the mechanism moving the animals up and down,” Gillmore said. “His wheels are always turning.”
When she graduates, she will be a third-generation engineer. Her stepfather was an electrical engineer, and his father, whom she never met, was a mechanical engineer.
“My stepfather was the closest thing I had to a father growing up, and he’s the one who took my love of math and science and got me interested in electrical engineering,” Gillmore said. “He died two months before my son was born. So, I’m doing this for him, and I’m doing this for my family.”
— Sean M. Wood
