Students gathered in Westlawn’s Gunden Commons for an event co-organized by the Latino Student Union and the Academic Success Center to celebrate Goshen College’s first-generation students on Wednesday.
The event featured cookie decorating, coloring sheets, a photo booth and a wall for first-generation students to pass advice onto their peers. Pins were also available for students to show pride in their first-generation status or for their peers to wear in solidarity.The event also helped raise awareness for a potential first-generation student club, which would be advised by Isel Herrera, success coach in the Academic Success Center. Herrera said, “I just want to find a place of belonging for these students — where I have so many students tell me, ‘I feel like I’m alone in this process,’ when they’re not. I’m hoping to bring in a variety of different students to come together and to build the club themselves.”
Angie Vega, a first-year nursing major, is a first-generation student at GC. She would like her peers to support her and her fellow first-generation students. “I just want you to understand my perspective, about why I’m dedicated to getting my diploma rather than just checking it off,” she said.
