And while it may seem strange for a 20-something-year-old to speak passionately about a career that involves daily contact with tragedy and death, Berrios feels honored to be able to help grieving families find peace. Funerals are for the living, she said, they are meant to help those left behind to remember a life.
Jasmine Berrios' work at the mortuary fulfills both her interest in science and her drive to help people, she says.Jolena Grande is a professor in the Mortuary Science Program at Cypress College in California. She recalled that in 1989, when she was just a student in the mortuary program, nearly 95% of her classmates were white males. In 2022, the graduating class was 100% female, with the vast majority of the demographic identifying as Latina or Black, she said.
Many women in funeral services have to overcome the propensity for people to think that they don't belong, Grande said.