President Nan Keohane is accustomed to selling Duke to groups of prospective students. But for the first time, she specifically welcomed Latino students to campus Thursday night, kicking off the inaugural Latino Student Recruitment Weekend.
"The first annual anything is a huge milestone," Keohane said. "I hope that many, if not all, of you will be at Duke in the future to help build the Latino community."
This year more than 650 Latino students applied to the University, marking the largest increase ever in Latino applicants; 46 of those admitted visited this weekend. The University paid full plane fare for half of the students and provided extensive programming throughout the weekend.
In addition to Thursday night's welcome dinner in the Levine Science Research Center, which was also attended by Office of Intercultural Affairs Director Julian Sanchez, the high school seniors were treated to a faculty luncheon, multicultural festival and "Life at Duke" student panel.
The students also attended the Blue Roach open mic night at the Coffee House and rode in limousines to Noche Dorada, Lambda Upsilon Lambda Fraternity Inc.'s annual semiformal at the downtown Marriott Hotel.
Trinity junior Christopher Brandt, a member of Lambda Upsilon Lambda, proposed the idea for the Latino Weekend in February 1998, and worked with administrators all year to make it a reality. "It's really fantastic to see such a tremendous turnout," Brandt said at the welcome dinner. "This has been a vision, the realization of a lot of hard work from a lot of people. This weekend is a big step for diversity and the University in general."
The prospective students, whose home states ranged from Wisconsin to Arkansas, were mainly just excited to see Duke.
"The cultural thing is good, it promotes a sort of unity," said Alex Sanchez, who lives in New Mexico. "Mostly it's an opportunity to come to Duke, because I've never been."
Veronica Guzman, an admissions officer who focuses on Latino students, expects to use the weekend as a recruitment tool. For several decades, the University has sponsored the Black Student Alliance Invitational weekend, which provides similar activities for black prospective students.
The student body is currently four-percent Latino, and the Latino weekend might raise Duke's numbers in relation to other top-tier universities-nearly all of which have recruitment programs that include Latino students, Guzman said.
"Because the numbers of Latino students keep growing, this will be a wonderful way to create some new energy," Guzman said.
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