Puente/Umoja strives to promote cultural awareness
Juan Carlos Gil
Issue date: 9/22/09 Section: News
|
The Puente and Umoja programs help Latino, African-American and other students prepare to successfully get through college and transfer into four year institutions. A team of professors, counselors and staff members are there to ensure student academic success, personal growth and self actualization by integrating culture in their learning experience.
Umoja, a Kiswahili word meaning unity, began at Diablo Valley College in Oct. 2006; it focuses on helping mostly African-American students through a curriculum of African cultural themes. Students in the Umoja community complete a series of math, English and personal growth courses throughout a 3 semester period, during these 3 semesters.
Umoja is coordinated by Erin Charles.
The Puente program has the same objective as that of the Umoja community, except that Puente integrates Mexican-American/Latino authors, experiences and issues into its educational curriculum.
Puente was started in 1981 at Chabot Community College in Hayward, Calif. and it now has over 58 community college sites throughout the state. Studies showed that Latino students were avoiding counseling, not enrolling in college-level writing courses and were the first in their families to attend college.
The Puente model designed by Felix Galaviz and Pat Mcgrath co-founders of Puente was created to counter these tendencies among Latino students with three essential components: rigorous language arts instructions, sustained academic counseling and mentoring by members of the professional community.
Like the Umoja community, Puente also strives to make their student's voices, histories and cultures get recognized to help build a foundation for academic success.
"It helps to learn about your culture; it brings a sense of comfort, plus the instructors and students give you great support" Umoja student Ashlee Burney said.
Be the first to comment on this story