With a goal of representing Latin American students in Delft, LATITUD is a student society that offers much more than that. They aim to create a network.
The relatively young organisation started one year ago when some people from the TU Delft International Student Ambassador programme came up with the idea of a society for Latin American students. With help from the former Mexican Student Association, a team of five founding board members built the new group from the ground up.
The mission of LATITUD, according to their media manager Pablo Ortiz, is to bring Latin American students together and to link them to social life in Delft. But they also aim to connect students with industry and to create bridges with Dutch companies. “We all contact our former universities and employers so that we can share connections both here and in our home countries,” said Ortiz, a Colombian industrial design master’s student. “It’s also great that some graduates represent a portal to the professional world.”
Professional event: Master Match
The group recently hosted their first professional event called Master Match. Similar to speed dating, participants from different backgrounds were paired one-on-one in order to develop academic and professional networks on campus that are both multidisciplinary and multicultural. The event also featured talks by several Latin American professors from both Delft and Leiden.
The lively cultural events hosted by LATITUD feature themes related to Latin American countries. The first one celebrated Dia de Muertos, or day of the dead, in honour of a Mexican tradition. Another was called The Peru Experience. These events feature traditional food, music, introduction to aspects of the culture and, unsurprisingly, there is always dancing.
Sense of home and hope
Ortiz emphasised that their vision is about the person. “This is not a fraternity where we only want to be friends with each other,” he said. “We want to offer a sense of home as well as a sense of hope and expectation for the future.”
All professional events are hosted in English so everyone is welcome to participate. For more information, visit their Facebook page.
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