For the past 15 years, Park City High School’s Latinos in Action chapter has created a space for the school’s Latinos to celebrate their heritage and give a voice to their underrepresented communities.
This year, seniors Jessica Loya and Bridget Wysong serve as presidents, and juniors Gabriel Villanueva and Amy Nava are the vice presidents. All four students said they’ve been involved with Latinos in Action since the middle school level, either at Treasure Mountain or Ecker Hill.
At the middle school level, the Latinos in Action class spends time preparing students for the expectations of high school, said Nava.
“From my experience being LIA at Ecker Hill, it was more identity based, and same at Treasure. It was more like they were trying to teach you how to be a leader … to build you up so you’re prepared,” she said. “They’re kind of preparing you to find your identity, where do you identify in your community, being latina, (and) what does that mean to you.”
Nava said this preparation and identity work is crucial.
“(It’s) an important part of being a leader. If you know who you are and where you identify, you can help others identify themselves. You’re prepared to help larger groups of people,” she said.
As presidents, Loya and Wysong said they want to focus on larger community projects. Now in their second quarter, Latinos in Action are putting together one of their largest outreach programs of the year — Culture Week, a four-day spirit week capped off with a Día de los Muertos event. This is the first year since COVID that Latinos in Action will be hosting the full-on Día de los Muertos event.
From Monday to Thursday, the student body was invited to participate in four themed days for Culture Week: Jersey Day, Flag Country Day, Throwback Day and Traditional Attire. Thursday evening, the public is invited to the school for the Día de los Muertos celebration, which will finish off the week’s festivities.
The goal of Culture Week is to encourage students to celebrate their cultures and heritage — not just Latinos, but everyone, the leaders said.
“One of the main themes of Culture Week is to expose the school,” said Villanueva. “The demographic of the school is majority — at least 80% — white. So, maybe a lot of them aren’t exposed to other cultural traditions other than their own.”
They hope Culture Week can give their peers insight into what other people around the world do, he said.
“(Culture Week is) to share our cultural experiences, with the traditions, … as a community and show that we can all celebrate something together and not necessarily have to be from the same ethnic background,” said Nava.
Día de los Muertos is a holiday traditionally celebrated Nov. 1 and 2 and originating in Mexico, which is believed to be a time when the living can connect with their friends and family who have passed on.
Bringing this event back to the school was the class’ biggest challenge, the leaders said.
“There wasn’t really an outline for us at all to start it, so that’s something that the class has been participating with,” said Loya.
The students broke up into committees to plan for the big event, from marketing, decorations, dance and research, said Dr. Jacob Jobe, an English teacher who is in his second year of teaching the Latinos in Action class.
One committee focused on research in preparation for the event, because not all of the Latinos in Action students share a Mexican heritage.
“They did a bunch of research on Día de los Muertos and then presented to the class about history and the culture, making sure that we’re being accurate and not misrepresenting the groups that are a part of it,” said Jobe.
One priority for that committee was creating and educating on an ofrenda, an altar made during Día de los Muertos which the dead can visit. They are traditionally decorated with images of loved ones who have died, as well as significant items like marigold flowers, skulls and the favorite items or foods of loved ones.
They built an ofrenda in the main lobby of the school which will be on display throughout Culture Week, inviting students and faculty to bring in pictures of their loved ones who have died.
The Día de los Muertos celebration will be held from 5-7 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 9, at Park City High School. The evening will include food and music, and members of the class have been preparing traditional dances like the folklórico and a medley of different cultural dances. Attendees will also be invited to visit the ofrenda.
“The fact that we are bringing it back, since we haven’t been able to do it since the pandemic, I feel like it was such a key way to get all the community together,” said Wysong.
After this event, Latinos in Action will continue to celebrate what it means to share hispanic heritage, through their class and service-oriented work in the community, to complete their required 40 hours of volunteer work.
“They do Big Brothers Big Sisters, they volunteer at the Christian Center, volunteer for things within the school, they do translating for parent teacher conferences,” said Jobe, who explains that his role is primarily to support the student-led initiatives. Some students are also part of the equity group in the school district and speak at City Council meetings on topics such as affordable housing, he said.
These opportunities have been impactful, said Loya, sharing about a City Council field trip they did last year and her hope to facilitate another.
“It gets us involved within the community and important conversations. And because we’re LIA, we’re building a positive reputation for ourselves so that we can kind of be a voice for our community, and then encourage others to build their voice up as well,” said Loya.
Outreach in the community has also been empowering for Nava.
“It’s been interesting to be able to talk to people that I wouldn’t ever have thought I would talk to just because we’re doing so much for the community. For me, it’s definitely been a journey. Because I can help people that look like me, but not only that, help people that live in my hometown,” she said.
Without a doubt, Latinos in Action has had a huge impact on the students who take the elective class, said the student leaders, in part thanks to their teacher.
“Dr. Jobe has a pretty extensive background in ethnic studies, and he makes sure to incorporate that in class so we get to have those important conversations about our culture and identity while we’re in a safe space, surrounded by classmates that we have a lot in common with,” said Loya.
Jobe earned his Ph. D. from the University of Utah in antiracist education, which has helped equip him for the class he said, but there’s only so much he can do considering he’s not Latino.
But for the leaders, just having a space to come together makes the Latinos in Action class invaluable. Not only because of similarities, but because of their differences as well.
“You’re put into a class where there’s something you all share — we’re all Latinos or we speak Spanish — but other than that, everyone’s so different and unique in their own way. You get to learn from them, whether it’s leadership-wise, or you feel comfortable and you can express yourself and make mistakes and you don’t feel bad about it, because everyone’s there to support each other. I like it when we all come together to get something done, like Culture Week,” said Loya.