By Ashna Balroop
University of Maryland students celebrated Latinx heritage this past month with various events, including a paint night, weekly Latin dance lessons, games, film screenings and a career panel.
Latinx Heritage Month is celebrated from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15. The Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy and the Coalition of Latinx Student Organizations collaborated to plan this month’s events.
The theme, “Sueños sin Fronteras,” which means “dreams without borders,” helps Latinx students reflect and honor the sacrifices prior generations have made and reflect on the impact of immigration on their communities, according to the MICA website.
Alex Mullen, the coordinator of Latine Student Involvement at the MICA office, said that Latinx Heritage Month is made up of a multitude of different events, along with an opening ceremony on Sept. 13 and a closing ceremony on Oct. 17. However, this year included more student involvement.
“This year was amazing because the students made inputs on programs and activities that we could host,” Mullen said. “At the opening celebration, we had a dance performance from a Bolivian folk dance group, and that was completely organized by students I was working with. So that was fun to see and bring on campus.”
Latixe Heritage Month provides a space for Latinx students to feel comfortable with community members. One of the events, Latin dance lessons, was held on Sept. 16 and 18, as well as on Oct. 7 and 9. It provided students with free weekly bachata and salsa dance classes. No experience was required for students to participate.
“It’s always just fun seeing, you know, community members celebrating, dancing, hanging out and having fun in an area that is outside of class rather than focusing maybe on the ways that our communities are marginalized,” Mullen said.
The University Career Center and the Latinx Alumni Association hosted one of the month’s highlighted events, the “Dream Beyond: Latin Heritage Month Career Panel.”
The panel connected students to University of Maryland alumni and community members who have navigated similar career paths.
Panel members Jose Umaña, Maritza E. González, Manuel Teran Hernández, Alejandra Benitez and Analucy Benavides discussed their personal and academic lives, their career paths and how they navigated common life experiences that Latinx students face during their college life.
González, a vice president and community manager at JPMorgan Chase & Co., offered students advice as to how to navigate their Latinx family. González, a UMD alum, explained that her parents didn’t understand what an honors program meant, and shared that she almost had to drop out of the College Park Scholars program.
To foster parental understanding, González recommended that the student audience “open their minds to those opportunities” and have open conversations with their parents about these programs.
Benitez, a national internship program coordinator for the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities, further discussed the issue surrounding parent involvement.
“Our parents tell us to go to school and get an education. That’s pretty much the extent to which they know, not the other scenarios,” Benitez said.
Jeffrey Quinteros Ceron, the graduate assistant for Career Education and Exposure at the University Career Center, organized the career panel. He put this event together to help inspire Latinx students at UMD.
“I’m a first-gen Latino student myself, and when I went to a small college in Richmond, Virginia, I didn’t have a community of other Latinx students around me to give advice. My parents didn’t go to college. They barely finished high school,” Quinteros Ceron said. “I was really inspired to kind of have this panel so other undergraduate students can feel comfortable and know it’s possible to make it in this country, even if you don’t have a lot of people supporting you.”
The panel, while having a smaller turnout, Quinteros Ceron admitted, garnered great feedback, helping students network with professionals.
“[The attendees] were very vocal about having this kind of connection and also getting support on what they can do with their major and life after college. The reviews were mostly positive on having the support and getting to know more people on campus with our heritage so they can get a job after college,” Quinteros Ceron said.
Mullen said that events like these are important to students and the community.
“These are some of the only events students have directly for their community. It’s fun to be able to put these activities together since it’s meaningful and can be some of the biggest memories they take away from undergrad,” Mullen said.
Featured Image: Panelists José Umaña, Maritza E. González, Manuel Teran Hernández, Alejandra Benitez and Analucy Benavides engage in a Latine Heritage Month career panel in Hornbake Library. Photo by Ashna Balroop.