The Latino Coalition elected College sophomore Robert Medina -- who coordinates the Latino Dialogue Institute -- as its chairman on Wednesday.
Medina is also editor-in-chief of La Vida magazine, a Latino-interest publication on campus. He served as a voting member of the LC before becoming chairman.
He spoke to The Daily Pennsylvanian on his new job uniting the 23 Latino organizations on campus.
DP: What are your goals for the Latino Coalition this year?
RM: We have multiple goals, but the most important one is to continue the successes of the previous board in uniting the 23 Latino organizations within the LC.
We aim to become more visible on campus, particularly in ... admissions and retention of Latino students.
We also want to participate much more in cultural and intercultural events with different organizations.
DP: How do you plan on achieving these goals?
RM: We definitely want to reach out, particularly to freshmen and to freshman leaders ... to get much more involved in the Latino Coalition through our constituent groups.
Also, we have to establish our foundations. Our main goal to unite the 23 Latino organizations [is] going to help us with our cause. By uniting the 23, we feel that we can present a united front at the university level.
DP: What kind of changes do you hope to make or do differently from last year's board?
RM: We hope to improve our relationship with the admissions office and gain a more significant presence with the multicultural recruitment program. That's our main source of improvement. ... We're trying to continue to emphasize these particular goals because we want to continue the legacy of past boards.
DP: What big events do you have planned for next semester?
RM: Festival Latino, which is going to be held in the last week of March. It's our big week to celebrate Latino culture. We're going to have keynote speaker events, and we're going to focus on cultural immersion events and also movie events.
Other members of the new executive board include College sophomore and Communications Chairman Brian Garbow, College freshman and Programming Chair man Luiz Gomez, and Wharton sophomore and Political Chairwoman Priscilla Matos.
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