Angel Williams and daughter Caijanai “Cai” Gates plan to wear matching outfits for Mother’s Day this year. Both will don a cap and gown for Ursuline College’s commencement on May 11 at the Bert L. and Iris S. Wolstein Center in Cleveland.
For Williams, this is her second time wearing Ursuline’s blue and yellow colors.
She earned her undergraduate degree in nursing 14 years ago when she was a single parent who worked nights as a licensed practical nurse. Occasionally, she could be found on campus with her three young children visiting the library or attending meetings with her academic advisor. The now-grown Cai will be by her side again as the mother-daughter duo take turns crossing the stage to pick up their degrees: a Doctor of Nursing Practice for mom and a Bachelor of Arts in psychology for her middle child.
“I tell people that my kids were going to Ursuline before they were going to Ursuline,” jokes Williams whose youngest daughter, Anjoel, just completed her freshman year in the college’s nursing program.
“When I first came to Ursuline College, I was worried that people would judge me about being a single mom,” Williams said. “But everyone was so supportive and welcoming. I had great teachers and mentors who just wanted me to be my best self. And the same was true when I went for my doctorate.”
Williams, a family nurse practitioner with two master’s degrees, works at MetroHealth caring for people living with obesity. She began her DNP classes during the COVID pandemic. “I decided to take advantage of the world being shut down.”
During that time her mother April Gary, a 2015 Ursuline alumna, became ill. Williams interrupted her studies to care for her mother, who died in June 2023.
“She said she was inspired to go back to school after I finished my undergraduate (degree),” Williams recalled. “She was so proud that I was getting my doctorate. Before she passed, she told me, ‘finish it.’”
Williams, who hopes to be a professor, offered that same encouragement to her daughter.
In high school, Gates experienced some depression and anxiety which worsened in college during the pandemic. Both her mental wellbeing and her grades suffered. “My academic advisors suggested I take a break, get healthy and think about what I excited me,” she said. “With their encouragement and my mom’s support, I returned to Ursuline after a semester off and changed majors.”
But Gates said her journey still had its challenges.
“After I told my academic advisor, Thomas Frazier, that my grandmother passed and I was having a rough semester, he said, ‘Let’s get you graduated.’ He was one of the main people that made me feel like I belonged at Ursuline. I wouldn’t be where I am if it wasn’t for him.”
And now there’s no stopping this soon-to-be third-generation Ursuline graduate.
The 24-year-old is enrolled this fall in Tiffin University’s online master’s degree in psychology program with an emphasis on neuroscience. She hopes to eventually earn her PhD. When she’s not hitting the books, Gates can be found at her job as a case worker assisting women as they rebuild their lives after surviving domestic violence. Previously, she worked at a social service agency as a youth advocate.
“I found my passion at Ursuline and it’s helping people,” she said.
Over the past year, she even helped to her mother a little. “I would proofread her papers sometimes,” said Gates, who commuted to college from her mom and stepdad Kelly’s home. “But really, we helped each other. She would check on me to make sure I was going to class. I would check to see if she was doing her coursework.”
Claire Zangerle, chief executive officer of the American Organization for Nursing Leadership and the chief nurse executive of the American Hospital Association will be the speaker at Ursuline’s May 11 commencement.
The college expects to graduate more than 330 undergraduate and graduate students into the fields of healthcare, business, arts, science, education and more.
Founded in 1871, Ursuline College is an accredited liberal arts college rooted in Catholic traditions of intellectual inquiry and social justice. Historically a women’s college, Ursuline educates male and female students for service, leadership and professional excellence through a variety of undergraduate, graduate and degree-completion programs in the liberal arts, nursing, and professional studies. It is home to the Breen School of Nursing and Health Professions, a National League of Nursing Center for Nursing Excellence.
In the photo above, provided by the Willams-Gates family, Angel Williams, middle, is shown with her late mother April Gary, right, and her late grandmother Joyce Fears, left, after Williams’ 2011 Ursuline College commencement.