Though Menlo often puts on elaborate celebrations for heritage months like Hispanic Heritage Month or cultural holidays such as Lunar New Year, affinity groups are typically responsible for proposing these events. Recently, though, due to limited space and scheduling constraints, many felt as if their groups were being sidelined or overlooked, which has led the school to implement a new system where affinity groups are now rotating into assemblies.
According to Marco Menéndez, who is in his first year as Menlo’s Director of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging, the administration has previously attempted to sponsor an assembly to celebrate each affinity group each year. However, this proved to be challenging as there were not enough Student Life blocks across the school year to accommodate all affinity groups amidst the plethora of other assemblies throughout the school year. “[The effort] resulted in last minute changes that required, for example, two affinity groups to share an assembly, […] leading the affinity groups to feel a sense of inequity,” Menéndez said.
Menendez knew something needed to change to accommodate all affinity groups in these school-wide meetings, which led him, Assistant Upper School Director Adam Gelb, and Dean of Student Life and Culture Alexis Bustamante, the Upper School leadership who oversee student life and diversity, to implement a new assembly system that rotates affinity groups through assemblies each year. As a result, each group is only able to host one assembly over a span of around four years.
Although Menéndez is still finalizing the plan, the Black Student Union was the first to get an assembly because they were the first and only affinity group to request their own assembly last year for the 2024-2025 school year.
According to Menéndez, while it’s good to have group celebration of identities, he still wants the affinity groups to set their sights higher because affinity groups aren’t just defined by public assembly celebration. “They are meant to create a safe space where students of similar backgrounds can come together and talk about their experiences […] and explore [their backgrounds/heritage/culture] however they want through research, book studies and guest speakers,” Menéndez said.
Menéndez believes that the success of this new plan will be measured by the creativity affinity groups demonstrate, particularly in how they adapt and try new things. “When you know that you only get an assembly once every three, four years, you have more time to sort of plan it out and think about how you really want it to impact the school, and maybe it’ll have a higher production value,” Menéndez said.
Students from other student unions, like Latinos Unidos, believe that this change may promote a more equitable allocation of assemblies. In an email to the Coat of Arms, activities coordinator Diego Villegas noted that time constraints often made it uncertain whether groups could hold assemblies without rescheduling. Villegas believes this change may promote a more equitable allocation of assemblies, but feels that more representation is important. “I would like to see every group receive an opportunity for representation annually rather than only once every 3 years or so because it seems limiting,” he wrote.
In order to ensure that each affinity group gets the same amount of representation at assemblies, Menéndez and the Upper School administration plan to look at which groups have been granted the opportunity to host an assembly in the past. Then, they will decide which affinity groups can host an assembly based on that information while also considering current circumstances.“Once we have a conversation around that and determine if that number is right, we will begin to allocate specific affinity groups to assemblies,” Menéndez said.
Although Latino Unidos was unable to secure an assembly spot, the group still wanted to make sure that Hispanic Heritage Month was celebrated, which they did by organizing several events throughout the month. “We held a fundraiser to support ALAS, an organization dedicated to helping the Latinx community […], hosted a lunchtime spirit activity focused on Latin artists and a potluck featuring food from various Latin American countries,” Villegas said. According to Villegas, these events were successful and could serve as a potential replacement for an assembly in the event they are not granted a slot next year.
Once his plans are put into action, Menéndez wants to create a system that opens up fairness and transparency for all affinity groups. “I would expect that, within a four year period, every affinity gets to [host an assembly],” Menéndez said.
