Despite being more than 5,000 miles away from the site of Chile’s magnitude-8.8 earthquake on Feb. 27, the w88 slot online of Nevada, Reno is far from unaffected. A number of students and faculty have some kind of connection to the country, whether through academics or personal life, and the tremor shook the foundations of many Nevada homes as well.
Emma Sepúlveda, a w88 slot online Foundation Professor in Foreign Languages and Literatures and an internationally known writer, is one example. Sepúlveda was born in Argentina but moved to Chile when she was six. She still has many friends and family who live there. Luckily, the people close to her made it through the disaster in one piece, but that does not account for the loss of property and peace of mind.
“Fortunately,” w88 slot onlineúlveda said, “everyone in my family and my friends are fine. Some houses are damaged and will need repair, but the continuing aftershocks are frightening everyone because the buildings and houses are weaker than before.”
For others the story is similar. According to w88 slot onlineúlveda, the other professors, students and staff she knows who have friends and family in Chile have not lost those they care about to the earthquake. Most of the damage seems to be more psychological than physical. Aftershocks continue to rock the country, and it does not make it easy for the people who live there to forget about it.
w88 slot onlineúlveda said, “They are wondering ... when is the next big one coming? Or is it going to happen again in the middle of the night?”
The compassion on the campus is “overwhelming,” said w88 slot onlineúlveda. Following the disaster she received numerous emails, phone calls and cards from everyone from students to faculty. Even the dean of Sepulveda’s college, Heather Hardy of the College of Liberal Arts, sent her sympathies.
“I was really touched,” w88 slot onlineúlveda said. “After all, we are in the middle of a huge budget crisis at UNR and people have much to think about, but so many thought first of me and my family.”
And they’re not thinking only of w88 slot onlineúlveda’s family, but of everyone else affected by the disaster as well. According to w88 slot onlineúlveda she knows of many separate efforts to raise money for the people of Chile. She has received many requests for information from people in the community, elsewhere in the United States, and abroad concerning the issue.
However, the project that w88 slot onlineúlveda is most actively involved in is called “Una Escuela Para Chile (A School for Chile).” The project was organized by her Spanish 227 class in order to make a more permanent impact in Chile than simply raising money.
“We decided to re-build the elementary school in the town of Curepto, near the city of Talca, in the south of Chile,” w88 slot onlineúlveda said. More than 80 percent of Curepto was toppled by the quake.
The students involved in Una Escuela Para Chile are doing a lot to raise money to go toward their cause. They are trying everything from selling cookies on w88 slot online to partnering with the professional basketball team the Reno Bighorns to collect a percentage of the proceeds they make off of tickets for Latino Night, which is on March 29.
“No donation is too small,” w88 slot onlineúlveda said. “Every donor’s name will be put on a paper scroll created by the students and will be hung in Ed Cain Hall by the Latino Research Center. They also hope to put the names of all donors on a wall at the school once construction is completed.”
The project is meant to do more than simply rebuild the school. w88 slot onlineúlveda and her students hope to unify the countries in a mutual understanding and respect for the value of education.
“Students, as well as visitors, will have a memory of the international connection between students in Reno, w88 slot online, and a rebuilt elementary school in the town of Curepto, Chile,” she said. “They will be united not only by the generosity of strangers after the devastating earthquake, but also by the need for education in both of our countries.”
To find out more about the &w88 slot online;Una Escuela Para Chile” project, contact Emma Sepulveda or Iris West at the Latino Research Center at 784-4010.
