MSC SCOLA, Student Conference on Latinx Affairs, is a three-day conference that will be taking place from April 4 to April 6 in the Memorial Student Center.
This year’s conference speakers will include Amara La Negra for the Afro-Latinx festival, Maximo Anguiano, Adriana Alejandre who is the host of Latinx Therapy Podcast, Carlos Ojeda Jr., Eduardo Chavez, Cesar Chavez’s grandson and American labor leader Dolores Huerta.
Committee conference chair Ashley Sosa said she believes MSC SCOLA is a platform for students to see themselves represented in a positive light, especially for Latinx students.
“As we inch closer to being a Hispanic-Serving Institution, I think it’s important that we bring all the positivity to one place and we do that through our conference by bringing in these big keynote speakers that are doing amazing work for our community,” Sosa said. “[We are also] having all these students that come from across the country to this conference [which] is actually the largest student-led Latinx focus conference in the nation, and it’s hosted here at A&M.”
Tickets are $12 for students and $15 for non-student for the Afro-Latinx festival featuring La Negra. For the closing gala featuring Huerta, individual tickets are $17, and full tables for eight people are $120, including dinner.
Director of entertainment Marissa Castillo said the conference helps Latinx students to empower delegates — people attending the conference — to participate in the Latinx community. She thinks it gives them tools and leadership skills to use in the future. Delegates will get to participate in workshops and activities during the conference.
“I think that [the conference] allows for Latinx students to feel as though their voices are being heard but also allows for education of Latinx culture,” Castillo said. “I think it brings awareness to different issues that face the Latinx community.”
Sosa said MSC SCOLA is an event that speaks to the progression of diversity at A&M. Sosa said the conference might be the only opportunity for students to see issues related to them highlighted.
“If you kind of think about the history of SCOLA, when it started, it wasn’t nearly as big as it is now,” Sosa said. “However, I think it speaks a lot to A&M creating a culture of putting these issues front and center and making sure everyone knows about them.”
This year’s theme is ‘Sooñando en grande’ which is Spanish for ‘Dreaming big.’ Sosa said the theme is meant to state that the current generation is not the same as previous ones since there is a massive increase in college education and not as many ties to manual labor jobs like previous generations.
“We’re just really excited, and we want everyone that wants to be a part of it to reach out to us if they want to get involved in some way whether that’s attending some of the free events, some of the ticketed events and just, in general, coming to learn about the conference,” Sosa said. “Our biggest thing is just exposure and making sure everyone that wants to be a part of it gets to be a part of it.”
To purchase tickets, visit boxoffice.tamu.edu/online/