La Casa Latina is offering a range of events in celebration of its 25th anniversary and Latinx Heritage Month. 

La Casa Latina, the main center for Latinx students at the University, organized a schedule for the month featuring panel discussions, an author talk, student gatherings, and conferences. It also hosted a symposium on Sept. 21 recognizing a quarter-century of “dedicated service, advocacy, and cultural empowerment,” according to La Casa Latina Director Krista Cortes. 

“This anniversary is not just a recognition of the center’s founding but a reflection on the collective efforts of its founders and the ongoing work required to serve a dynamic and diverse Penn Latine community,” Cortes said.

The celebration commenced with the Procession of Flags on Sept. 16, where students marched down Locust Walk holding the flags of Latin America. The event was followed by an Open House of La Casa Latina. 

On Sept. 21, a symposium centered around La Casa Latina’s 25th anniversary took place at the ARCH Building, featuring two panels and an award luncheon. 

The first panel reflected on the center’s evolution and impact since its establishment in 1999. Founding members Luz Marin and Jorge Santiago-Aviles spoke on the panel, as well as Nursing senior Salvador Galvez Jr. The second session featured the perspectives of students and recent graduates on the intersections of identity and activism. 

In her remarks at the symposium, Cortes described the cultural center as a “landing space” for students. 

She highlighted the establishment of the Latinx Graduation Ceremony in 2021, which offers a bilingual graduation in English and Spanish as students walk the stage with their parents and relatives. La Casa Latina also invites cultural dancers, musicians, and speakers to perform at the graduation. Cortes said that the initiative emerged from student efforts after the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted many of their formative years. 

La Casa Latina gave out seven awards to students and faculty to celebrate their contributions to Penn’s Latin community. The two Service & Dedication Awards went to retired office coordinator Maritza Santiago Torres and Johnny Irizarry, who is the longest-serving director of La Casa Latina.

Amelia Becerra, a College junior and La Casa Latina program assistant, said during the symposium that it’s always “nice to see alumni come back, as they help me believe it is possible to do something here and to see that they’ve all been successful really validates my experience.” 

On Sept. 26, graduate students congregated in Castor Courtyard for the Graduate Student Bienvenida. To conclude September’s celebrations, Luis Miranda Jr., a Puerto Rican author, visited the University on Sept. 30 to discuss the role of Latinx voices in politics. 

Future events for October include the Dolores Huerta lecture and the 7th PLAC Conference, which will discuss public and community-engaged scholarship in Latin America, the Caribbean, and its diaspora.

College senior and La Casa Latina program assistant, Andrea Barajas, who was also a photographer for the Daily Pennsylvanian, said that planning these events didn’t come without challenges. 

During previous Latinx Heritage Months, La Casa Latina hosted events nearly every day. This year, to remedy the stress of organizing such frequent events, Barajas said that La Casa Latina is focusing on “recognizing their capacities and limitations.” 

Barajas added that La Casa Latina has worked to plan fun events despite funding options becoming more limited. For example, she led an event in February where she made paper flower bouquets, having purchased paper and fake flowers in bulk from Amazon.

“We’ve had to get a bit more conservative with the financial aspect, but that also means we get to be a little more creative with it,” Barajas said. 

Galvez Jr. said that La Casa Latina has greatly evolved since he joined as a first year, especially in terms of engagement and outreach. 

“It seems like there are a lot more Latine students on campus, and I think those students are finding the space of La Casa,” Galvez Jr. said. “A part of me is really proud of the work that we’re putting into making sure that people know we’re a center, a resource for them.”

Galvez Jr. also said that there has been an increase in programming and event planning, highlighting the establishment of the bilingual graduation.

“Latine graduating students at Penn always share that that’s something really special to them, especially when their parents may not speak English or come from immigrant households,” Galvez Jr. said. “Having a graduation that they can participate in and semi-understand is really nice as well.”

Looking ahead, La Casa Latina aims to engage with the broader Philadelphia Latinx community, build connections with Latinx alumni, and compile a digital archive of Latinx legacies at the University. In 2025, La Casa Latina will launch a scholars program that supports undergraduate and graduate students.

“Our main goal is to increase our visibility and really show administration and continue to show students that we are a resource for them,” Galvez Jr. said.

When College senior Timethius Terrell was losing motivation to continue his non-profit startup focused on intercultural allyship, he turned to the Albert M. Greenfield Intercultural Center (GIC) for help.

Not only did GIC director Valerie de Cruz CGS’02 and associate director Kia Lor GEd’16 provide guidance, but Terrell has also become one of the many regulars at the center, which for 40 years has been a haven for people of all ethnicities, backgrounds, and nationalities to come together and breathe after a hard day at Penn. He even interned at GIC during the summer of 2022.

“I still consider myself to be an active member of this community,” Terrell said this spring. “Maybe not as formally,” he allowed. “I think that’s what makes it special, though—you don’t have to be.”

The Greenfield Intercultural Center was established in 1984, six years after the United Minorities Council, a coalition of minority student organizations, signed a petition to have its own space on campus.

To mark its 40th anniversary, the GIC is holding events throughout the year, including a celebration in their building at 3708 Chestnut Street that took place on January 27—exactly 40 years after its founding. The celebration included musical performances, cake-cutting, and the presentation of awards to Penn alumni who were recognized for embodying the spirit of the GIC through work in their communities. One of the honorees, Angbeen Saleem C’12—a creative artist, writer, and poet who “spent all of my free time at the GIC” as a work-study student there—read two poems she had written for the event.

“A lot of these alumni come back and they bring their kids and they say hi to Val,” remarked College senior and GIC work-study student Oumy Diasse. “You could kind of just look around and see everyone’s super familial.”

In addition to providing a friendly space for students to meet casually and share meals, the GIC also sponsors events related to culture and race and has helped establish and nurture programs and organizations for minority groups including the Persian Student Society, the Turkish Student Organization, and Natives at Penn [“Native Pride,” Jul|Aug 2019], which marks its 30th anniversary this year. It also helped to launch Makuu: The Black Cultural Center, the Pan-Asian American Community House (PAACH), and La Casa Latina Center, all of which are currently based at the revamped ARCH building on Locust Walk [“Gazetteer,” Nov|Dec 2022]. In 2016, Penn’s First-Generation Low-Income Program (FGLI) opened in the GIC, which also started an alumni mentorship program for FGLI students called Penn FLASH.

The January 27 celebration brought many alums back. “A lot of the stuff I do now is connected to my time here,” said Sean Vereen GEd’00 GrEd’05, who was the associate director of the GIC from 2003 to 2006 and now runs the Philadelphia-based college and career-access program Steppingstone Scholars. De Cruz, who’s served as the GIC’s director for the last 27 years, is another reason alumni love to return. “[Valerie] has a real power to stay connected to people,” Vereen noted. “She makes them feel like individuals. And she has weathered all the changes on campus and been able to maintain [the GIC].”

“I think the most important thing I bring is the building of relationships,” said de Cruz.

For current work-study student and College sophomore Kaynath Chowdhury, “the GIC’s a home.” At the center she often finds herself washing dishes, taking out the trash, giving tours, helping with events, and greeting people at the door. It’s a far cry from office work, she says; it’s more like what she would do at her own family’s house.

The familial atmosphere seemed to make an impression on College freshman Theo Greenfield C’27, the great-grandson of prominent Philadelphia-based businessman Albert M. Greenfield, whose foundation supplied the grant to launch the GIC. An additional $1 million gift from the Albert M. Greenfield Foundation a decade ago helped to endow the GIC and increase staffing and expand its programs.

“There are people here who have dedicated their lives to not just the GIC but the mission of the GIC as an intercultural center,” said Theo, who came to the anniversary event largely out of curiosity. “It’s honestly inspiring. … I would like to become more involved.”

While the 40-year milestone provided a welcome chance to celebrate the work that has gone into making the GIC what it is, attendees were also looking ahead. “Places like the GIC are not just havens but really the center of the work that the University has to do in the future,” Vereen said.

“If you don’t see yourself envisioned in this space,” de Cruz said, “come tell us how you can envision yourself in this space, and we will work with you to create that. And that will in turn change Penn. That’s the story.”

—Hannah Chang C’27