Latino students are asking the College to increase support for their community by giving it space on campus and an advisor.
Executives of La Alianza Latina, the College's Latino student group, met with Provost Lee Bollinger, Director of Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Mary Childers, Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid Karl Fursternberg, Dean of the College Lee Pelton and Dean of the Faculty James Wright on Wednesday.
Ramyar Rossoukh '96, La Alianza's secretary and former president, said he thinks Latino students need to have their own space for meetings and events.
"The Latino community is the largest under-represented ethic community that doesn't have a space of its own," he said.
Pablo Barrutia '96, La Alianza's treasurer said having some kind of space is "important for the future of La Alianza." The group currently has its meetings in the Collis Center.
Although many Latino students live in and use La Casa, Rossoukh said La Casa's primary focus is as a Spanish affinity house. La Alianza currently has no formal connection with La Casa and will not cosponsor events with La Casa or host events in the house.
"The reason why La Alianza is taking that stance is because of the need for our own space," he said. "It is a way to make the College recognize that demand for space." He said there is no animosity between La Alianza and La Casa.
La Alianza is also asking the College for a full-time advisor, a permanent budget and increased recruiting of Latino students.
But Rossoukh said the meeting with the administrators was about more than that.
"The issue may be more importantly the lack of permanent institutional support from Dartmouth for Latino students," he said.
Pelton said the College is currently looking into finding an advisor and giving La Alianza a budget.
"Frankly, we haven't found any money," he said. "We're completely in a discussion stage. Even if we were to be able to locate or identify the funds, it is unclear what this person would actually do."
Rossoukh said the administration has been "responsive" to La Alianza's requests, but said he was not sure if or when something tangible would get done.
"If pressure is continued ..." he trailed off. "I'm not here to work for the College but to require that the College works for me and the other communities of color."
He noted that the College has made efforts like creating a dissertation position for a Latino scholar and increasing the number of Latin American and Caribbean Studies courses.
Because of the difficulties of finding space and funding, chan-ges will happen "long after I'm gone," Rossoukh said.
"Clearly the first step the College can take is to look for an advisor," he added.
Barrutia said Pelton told the group that he would "look into" finding space and an advisor, but was vague and offered no time table."It seemed to be going well," he said.
"They seemed very responsive, very open. They agreed with many of our issues," he said.
"I don't know what's going to come of it ... no promises were made," he said
He said the biggest stumbling block in the way of increasing support for Latino students is money.
"Everything seems to revolve around money -- is the money around for this?" he said. "At the moment, that isn't existing around here."
Latino students currently make up about 4 to 4.5 percent of the student body, according to Rossoukh.
He said the College is realizing the increasing numbers of Latinos in America, but noted that there are about one-half as many Latinos as African Americans in the Class of 1998.
"More [Latinos] are applying, but less are matriculating," he said. "There's clearly something about the College that is steering them away."
Rossoukh suggested that the lack of a central space where Latino students could have as a resource or for housing might make Latinos not want to come to Dartmouth.
"What separates the Latino community is that we don't have a space, we don't have a resource center, we don't have an advisor," he said.
Barrutia said he agreed, saying Latino students are turned off by the fact that there is no space.
"It seems to be one of the deciding factors for Latino students in their decisions," he said.
Pelton said he did not know when the College could possibly provide space to Latino students.
Wednesday "was the first time I've heard of it," Pelton said.
"All I am saying is that we'll consider it," he added. "We all know space is very precious around here."
In a panel discussion Wednesday night, La Alianza President Ana Henderson '94 said there is a large demand in the Latino community for some sort of living area.
Henderson, who also was at the Wednesday meeting, was out of town and could not be reached for further comment.
