ALSAME recently held elections and the new Chair is Santos Gutierrez who works at Lansing Community College. Santos who works as a Mulitcultural Recruitment Coordinator at LCC. Chosen for the Vice Chair role was Patricia Young of Central Michigan University. Treasurer and Secretary are now Ignacio Andrade (Michigan State University) and Vanessa Nava (Wayne State Universtiy) respectively. These four officers will be taking over a organization that is known for its Fall Annual Conference that brings together students from around the State and for its assistance that it provides to many different High Schools with information about pathways to college.
One of the lesser known Latino Non-profits in the Mid-Michigan area but perhaps has one of the richest history’s is the ALSAME Organization. ALSAME stands for Advocates for Latino Student Advancement in Michigan Education. One of the more vibrant non-profits that we have in the area as it has a mixture of both young and experienced professionals that work together to promote higher education among the State’s Latino population.
ALSAME began in 1970 under the name of “Associations of Chicanos in College Admissions (ACCA) led by a group of Hispanic college admissions professionals who felt the need to address the low levels of Hispanics entering college. The Annual Conference, college fairs, High School visits, phone calls from school counselors (or regular people like me), answering questions by phone or email, attending area events to pass out information are just some of the ways that this group puts out the word of its usefulness. I myself have called people from some of these schools advocating for a high school student. I make the contact, connection and the ALSAME representative takes over. Instead of a student seeing something online about a college, they can get a live voice and someone whom the student might be more comfortable with.
Photo credit (Miguel Torres)
For more information please feel free to contact Santos Guiterrez at 517-483-9962
ALSAME on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/search/str/alsame/keywords_top
ALSAME on the web: http://www.alsame.org/home
