Futuro Latino Creates a College Exchange

Latino students at Niles West High School can get some support as they prepare for college from Futuro Latino, a club for the students and their parents.

Futuro Latino welcomed more than 50 people Sept. 23 to its first family gathering of the year, a potluck dinner where each family was invited to bring a dish from its country of origin. Teacher Luisa Karimighovanloo--also known as Senora K--and counselor Andrew Johnson used the event to bring the families together with the goal of facilitating the college preparation process.

Senior Alyssa Alvarez said the group’s visit to DePaul University helped her select the Chicago school, where she plans to study business administration. She said her parents, who are from Ecuador and do not have college degrees, always encouraged her to go to college, but they didn’t really know where to start.

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When Futuro Latino students visited DePaul, the admissions representative suggested they apply to take a summer course by writing an essay. “Sra. K made us all write the essay, and rewrite it, and rewrite it,” said Alvarez, who was accepted to the summer program.

Alvarez and Christina Leon were both in Senora K’s Spanish for native speakers class as freshmen and were among the founding members of Futuro Latino.

Leon hopes to attend an Ivy League school or Northwestern University to pursue a career in medicine. Her parents, both born in Mexico and raised in Chicago, made it clear that she and her brothers were expected to go to college.

But Leon's mother said that her daughter always knew what she wanted and would do whatever she could to achieve her goals.

“She’s known since she was 5,” said her mother, who is studying to become a teacher at National-Louis University on a fellowship that she found with the help of Johnson and Karimighovanlo.

According to Niles West’s 2010 Illinois state school report card, about 1 in 10 of the school’s 2,520 students are Hispanic or Latino. That’s less than half the state average. Leon said that it helps when the students band together so they know they aren’t alone.

Karimighovanlo said she started the group because, while nearly all Latino families want their children to go to college, most of the parents did not attend college in the U.S. As a result, they don’t always know everything their children need to do, from which classes to take to the importance of participating in clubs, sports and other activities.

“They need to know that they need to take honors classes and advanced classes,” the teacher said.

Johnson is the counselor for many of the students in Futuro Latino, and he told the parents–in Spanish–that even if their child is assigned to another counselor, he would be happy to help in any way.

The group also provides a forum to disseminate information that might be of interest to residents. At the dinner, Lincolwood resident Maria Ugarte-Ramos spoke about a series of six workshops, titled "Taking Control of Your Health," that she would be offering in Spanish.