Camino club aims to support Hispanic student body
The Camino Club was formed just over two months ago at Franklin High School. File photo
Editor’s note: While it is standard SMN and AP style to use last names when referring to people in articles, this story refers to students by their first names.
The Spanish word “camino” means road or path in English, and according to the student leaders of a new club at Franklin High School, that is exactly what they want their group to be.
“We want to be a path for all students, not just Hispanic, but all people who are willing to learn about our culture and our art and our language,” said Camino Club co-President Jennifer in a presentation to the Board of Education at its Feb. 17 meeting.
Camino stands for community, action, motivation, innovation and new opportunities, and the mission of the club is to raise awareness of Latino culture at Franklin High School, its impact on the school and the community at large.
“We wanted to make a club where we can all come together and know that in these times, we are united, we have each other and we shouldn’t fear,” Jennifer said.
Co-President Daisy said that one of the club’s goals is to seek support for emerging English speakers. While about 25% of Franklin High School identifies as Hispanic or Latino, Daisy said that this section of the student body is starkly underrepresented in school activities like sports and extracurriculars.
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“We just want to be a support system for them and promote greater involvement for them in the school,” said Daisy.
While the club formed just over two months ago, it has already hosted its first meeting, which garnered over 30 participants. The club also planned and hosted the Mr. and Mrs. FHS Dance, which raised over $700 for the club.
In addition, Camino Club has instituted Spanish announcements in the afternoon to help students who are still learning English. During the early phases of language acquisition, listening to disembodied voices can be especially challenging.
“We provide that information in Spanish so they’re able to know what’s going on around our school,” said another club officer.
Because the foreign language competition is no longer taking place at Western Carolina University, the Camino Club hopes to put together a similar event to host at Franklin High School.
“The most important goal we’re trying to do is just be a support group for each other,” said one club officer. “We just want to be able to unite with each other and be there to talk about life and what’s going on around us.”
Daisy said the anticipated outcomes for the club were to gain greater respect and understanding of a diverse Latino student body, as well as to share a vision of unity with not only the Hispanic student body, but also the non-Hispanic students.
“We want to gain greater community engagement with our Latino population and, again, just be an overall support group for all Hispanic students who are struggling or have any questions so they can be open to our school and know that they have safety and they have somewhere they have people to ask questions to without being scared to ask,” said Daisy.
Tyler Faetz is one of several staff advisors for the club. He said that in studying culturally and historically responsive education, he learned about the importance of visibility.
“You cannot serve us unless you see us, right? You cannot serve us unless you see us. And you see these students here, we see them, now you see them,” said Faetz. “So now we hope we can also better serve them. This is a really, really anxious time, as a lot of you know, for our Latino students, their immediate families and their extended families and they need all the support we can give them.”
