I attended Raza Grad yesterday. While there, I didn’t once think that the event was separatist or that it was making UCLA virtual Balkan peninsula in June. Raza Grad was the third graduation I attended over the weekend, and the second at UCLA. It was different than the first I attended, a schoolwide graduation at Mt. San Antonio College and the Psychology Department graduation at UCLA.

Instead, I just felt proud because I knew several of the graduates. They were all students I had seen grow throughout their four of five years at UCLA. It made me glad that I decided to stay here for graduate school because I didn’t have to sever my relationship with these students after I left MEChA Calmecac. I went from being their counselor to being a friend.

After reading the article and post linked above, I felt annoyed. Those guys don’t get it, but I don’t expect them to. After all, they didn’t attend a university where they initially felt lost. They don’t know what it’s like to transition from a high school where most student share your ethnic background. They don’t know what it’s like to be the only brown face in a class of 100 or more students. True, there are a lot of Latinos at UCLA, but no where near as many as the communities a lot us come from.

In response to the post at MayorSam, I offered my informed opinion, unlike a lot of the other commenters who had no idea what they were talking about.

I participated in UCLA’s Raza Grad five years ago. I also participated in a departmental graduation. I did not participate in the large 3,000 student graduation typically held on Friday afternoon.

I chose to do this for the following reasons:

• All of my friends were doing Raza Grad
• I was highly invested in MEChA, the organization that coordinated the planning and fundraising for the graduation*. I’d attended the ceremony before and knew I wanted to be part of it when the time came for me to graduate.
• The ceremony is fun and less dry than most graduation ceremonies. Danzantes lead the procession of graduates and following the keynote speaker, a band plays during the middle of the ceremony and students dance with their friends and faculty alike. For my graduation the band was Very Be Careful.
• I could invite as many people as I wanted unlike the larger graduation which limits the number of attendees a graduate can bring.

The fact that the ceremony is in English and Spanish was less important since the 18 family members who attended were all fluent in English, but I know this is not the case for many Latino students at UCLA.

Separatism and segregation did not come to mind when I decided to participate in Raza Grad. Instead it was about community. Raza Grad celebrated our accomplishments, but did so in the context of our families. You can see this as you flip through the dedications. Everyone thanks their parents. You don’t get anything like that at the larger graduation.

As I was leaving Pauley Pavilion, I bumped into an education professor. He had all the Raza Grad logos from the many years he has participated in the ceremony sewn on to a single stole. He asked, “will I see you here next year?”

“No,” I replied. “But I’ll be here in two years.”

*There’s a separate committee that does a lot of the work. A lot of those students in the committee are not in MEChA, but many are.