Let's be real. There's a lot of Jose's out there. One Jose is an astronaut that went to space in '09. Another Jose is a reggeaton mega-star. And there's even a Jose that's a homerun machine for the local baseball team. I'm the Jose that's on his way to plant a flag in the tech world.

Hola. I'm Jose Avalos. Proud to be American and grateful for my Mexican roots. Being bilingual and bicultural is pretty cool. I love twice as much food, listen to twice as many Spotify playlists, and laugh with twice as many friends.

I was also a first-generation college student. My amazing parents encouraged me to pursue an education, but their middle school education limited the advice they could give me. That presented some challenges, but I made it through thanks to God and great mentors helping me out.

I graduated from the University of Houston with a degree in Marketing. I experienced academic probation the first half of my college career (at Baylor University) and was a role model student in the second half. The saying is true. "It's not how you start that matters, it's how you finish."

After college, I've been in a series of marketing, sales, and creative roles across several industries. Most recently, I've been helping small business and nonprofit clients with digital marketing, graphic design, and branding services through my creative agency.

I also give back to the youth in my community. I serve as President of Creative Vida. Our mission is to educate and empower youth through creative experiences. One of those experiences is our scholarship program called 1STGEN where we give first-generation college students a brand new suit and put them through a soft skills bootcamp that teaches many of the things students don't really learn in college.

But...most of my energy will now be focused on a company my wife and i launched called TECH23. A media and entertainment company for the advancement of Latinos in Tech. We believe TECH23 will make a great impact and be a lot of fun to build! I'm especially excited about celebrating and exploring the people representing the 22 Latin-American flags and 'The 23rd Latino'™.