It took a community of multiple student generations to create today’s unique home away from home for so many Latino students at Rutgers University. The Center for Latino Arts and Culture (CLAC) began as a seed in the 1970s—with input documented and updated during the following 22 years—until it was established in 1992. Today, CLAC has become a large community and has provided a true home away from home.

“We felt such a sense of urgency, not just within the walls of the academy, but outside as well, when we finally established the center. In the early 1990s, we had a crisis in the public school system in the local New Brunswick schools with large numbers of Puerto Ricans and Dominicans. The schools were failing them,” said Isabel Nazario, associate vice president for Strategic Initiatives who was CLAC’s first director. “The center was critical in creating a safe place where students could plan programs and come together and be able to protest concerns with tuition, financial aid, admissions, and to celebrate their heritage. We also had individual faculty—less than a handful—who needed a place that could advocate on their behalf.”

CLAC’s History

When the idea for the center was first conceived—back in the 70s—there were only a few Latinos, primarily Puerto Rican Americans, who held administrative and faculty seats. But, by the time the center opened in the 1990s, Rutgers had over 30 Latinos in key positions, with strong allies ready to support the establishment of a center.

“It became so palpable in the 1990s to create a center because, for the first time, we had key Latino leaders within the institution.  We were the pioneers who came out of poverty and the civil rights movement into higher education,” Nazario said. “At the time, we had first-generation students who needed help with financial aid, career support, and even had their parents living in the dorms because they were homeless. The center became a place to help guide and support students, to reinforce and respect their culture, and to show them that they could be successful in higher education.”

Back in the 1970s, Latinos, and primarily those of Puerto Rican descent, made up 5% of the campus population. Most recent data shows that those numbers have reached up to 10% of the campus (there are 67,000 total students at Rutgers on four different campuses) and now consist of Puerto Rican, Dominican, Colombian, and, most recently, Mexican populations. Today, about 30 Latino organizations exist on campus, compared to four back in the 1970s.

With writers, celebrities and famous international artists coming together to help make this new center a vibrant place, CLAC was born. And since then, during the past 25-plus-years, it has touched the lives of so many more Latinos than it could have imagined. “It’s really hard for people to feel and understand what it entails to succeed at such a large university. So being able to come into a place that actually fosters growth—professional growth and personal growth—is one of the things that the CLAC does best,” said Alumnus Luis Vargas-Mena of the class of 2014 during the center’s 25th anniversary in 2018.  “It makes you feel as if you are home.”

The Current Center

Today’s CLAC, which has come a far way since its inception, offers the growing number of Latinos on campus direct support while advising organizations, in addition to providing cultural programming and community outreach. This “home away from home” has become a dynamic center for not only students, but also the Latino community at large around the four Rutgers’ campuses.

“We are student-centered and look at the whole student and their needs,” said Carlos Fernandez, CLAC’s director for the past 15 years. “Many of our students come from immigrant families and are the first generation to be in college. They often have limited resources and social capital, yet they come to Rutgers because it’s an opportunity for them to move ahead and improve their lives.”

The center helps these students navigate college life, which includes offering financial aid, admissions support, academic counseling, and preparing for the job world or further education. At the beginning of the year, and throughout the four years of education, students and their families gather at CLAC for both social events and counseling that helps in the retention and future success of all.

In addition, because of the strong immigrant backgrounds of many first-generation students, the center works with campus departments and programming to provide them with an education focused on better understanding those immigrant communities from which they come.

“We engage our students in reflecting on the immigrant experience, with artists, community members and campus departments,” Fernandez explained. “Most of our students don’t have a full understanding of the history of immigrant communities in the U.S.”

In an effort to better help students understand their own backgrounds or that of their peers, CLAC offers an alternative program for students to visit their countries of origin. This year, in mid-March, 25 students took a one-week trip to the Dominican Republic to do exactly that.

Students And Student Organizations

While CLAC keeps its doors open from early morning until later at night—offering students personalized support and a place to feel at home—it also provides support to student organizations on campus. Today’s Latino organizations on campus range from a Salsa club and an undocumented students’ club to professional organizations and fraternities and sororities for Latinos.

Student organizations receive the much-needed training, funding and advice from CLAC, in addition to leadership training. The center organizes a leadership retreat every fall, which Monika Gonzalez, a junior and president of the Latino Student Council, helped run this past year after having attended herself.

“If it weren’t for the retreat, I wouldn’t be the person I am today,” she said. “It opened my eyes to what Latinos offer on campus and gave me a sense of community away from home.”

Raised in Princeton, N.J., with parents from Mexico and Honduras, Gonzalez had never been on such a large campus with so many other Latinos. At her private Catholic school and in her community, she had gotten used to being a minority within a majority White culture. “I am still the same person now, but I am more confident,” she said. “I wasn’t proud of being Latino before until I saw how many people here were proud of their background and how many majored in Latino departments.”

As president of the Latino Student Council, Gonzalez has helped recruit Latino students from neighboring campuses, and establish a mentorship program to help with retention. This is the first year, under the center’s support, that she has brought together 15 alumni and 15 mentees to launch such an initiative.

Supporting Culture And Community

Beyond assisting student organizations like that of the Latino Student Council, CLAC also provides extensive cultural programming. It does so by working with different departments like that of Latino and Caribbean Studies. It has helped offer exhibits, performances, films and other events, in addition to its ongoing Café con Leche program with small discussion groups between successful Latinos in various careers and students preparing for the job market. All in all, CLAC provides more than 30 programs across campus, and is host to about 300 events a year.

The center has also played an important role in supporting the local Latino community. One of its key programs, Artists Mentoring Against Racism, Drugs and Violence: Healing Through the Arts Summer Program (AMAR), is a five-week intensive arts and life-skills program during the summer for kids 10 to 16 years old. “We established this program, so we could help kids have an alternative to being recruited by gangs,” Fernandez said. “We have engaged more than 200 Rutgers’ students during the past 22 years as camp counselors and have served several 1,000 students who have then completed school and become counselors in the program.”

Other programs that CLAC has worked with in the community include a coalition against domestic violence, local library activities and Lazos America Unida. Rutgers’ students have served as volunteers and interns in Lazos America Unida, an organization that has been the backbone of the Mexican-American community in the local New Brunswick community, and has provided health, wellness, and cultural support in the arts. The organization’s founder Teresa Vivar and her sister have also offered cooking classes at CLAC.

In addition, Latino students have also been a part of a domestic violence coalition by helping disseminate pamphlets and information to the local community during National Domestic Violence Awareness Month in October. In addition, CLAC has collaborated with the local library, offering exhibitions and workshops, like that of papel picado, with visiting artists.

Whether working with community members, enjoying cultural programming or receiving the much-needed support to succeed in college and beyond, CLAC has been there. “For some students, it means a difference of having an individual mentor or a staff member who helps validate their experience,” Fernandez said. “For some, it may mean the difference of losing financial aid, or struggling with career choices, or finally dropping out because they can’t make it all out. For some, it means having a community that has their back.”

From barbeques, to counseling, to community events and engagement, whatever form it takes, for many, like Gonzalez, “It’s really a home away from home.”  •