Marisela shouts ¡Adelante Caminantes!

Meet the volunteer who spends her days encouraging the Central American kids who come to the United States on foot without their parents to move forward with their lives.

marisela_horizonte — Marisela appreciates the horizon

This month’s Inspiration Pill focuses on Marisela Zamora, a 25-year-old American with Mexican roots who leads the Adelante Caminantes program at Hope CommUnity Center (HCC).

What is HCC?

HCC started out in the early 1970’s as a shared dream between the Notre Dame de Namur Sisters Cathy Gorman, Gail Grimes and Ann Kendrick who longed to bring social and economic justice to underserved communities in Apopka.

Inspired by the gospel’s principles of love, hospitality, solidarity and service, the Sisters built community by working hand-in-hand with the African American farmworkers and citrus pickers so as to understand their wants and needs. They later on partnered with local residents and groups and created six nonprofits to address illiteracy, healthcare access and economic injustice.

Today, HCC is “a service learning community dedicated to the empowerment of Central Florida’s immigrant and working poor communities”. They offer services in Education, Immigration, Youth and Families, Service Learning and Community Organizing at their two locations in Apopka, carrying forward its mission with the help of staff, volunteers and engaged members of the community.

What is Adelante Caminantes?

Adelante Caminantes is one of the Immigration Services offered at HCC alongside Pathways to Citizenship, Legal Immigration Services and the Know Your Rights program. Adelante Caminantes began in the Summer of 2014 as an answer to the North American Immigration Crisis. In the words of Marisela Zamora, the current coordinator of the program says: “Adelante Caminantes is for unaccompanied minors from Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and Mexico who are fleeing poverty, gang violence, threats and abandonment from parents who previously came to the US. The kids come for better opportunities, and some with the hope to reunite with their parents.”

Marisela explained the dynamic of the immigration process these children go through: “When they reach the border, they turn themselves in to immigration seeking asylum and are placed into centers. Once in the centers, they are assigned sponsors who take on the responsibility of feeding them, providing housing, educating them and helping them with the immigration process.”

However, a paradoxical situation occurs when it comes to education, a fundamental requirement to proceed with the immigration process. When the minors are 17-years-old, “The schools don’t want to accept them because they don’t want to ruin their graduation rate.” Hence, their immigration process can be put in jeopardy, so Adelante Caminantes becomes the alternative to school for these minors.

Adelante Caminantes serves kids from 13-18 years old, but focuses on 16, 17 and 18 because of the schooling catch-22 situation they face.

The program offers three levels of English, financial literacy, legal counseling, and group and individual therapy with 12 rotating volunteers from the community and 3 AmeriCorps volunteers.

The caminantes learn best practices of money management, basic life skills like saying their name and address or writing a check. The program also accompanies the immigration process keeping track of court dates and reminding the minors to attend court appointments religiously. Most importantly, they help the caminantes to share their stories, embrace their reality, recognize the difficulties they’ve undergone and become empowered to overcome traumas so as to carry on successfully with their lives.

Marisela Zamora: The Coordinator Behind Adelante Caminantes

hcc_entrance — Entrance of Hope Community Center

Marisela started volunteering at the age of seven alongside her role model, her mother Elvia Zamora. She says “We marched and rallied for immigration rights in Orlando, Apopka, Tallahassee and Washington D.C. with The Farmworkers Association of Florida. I also volunteered at Relay For Life and became involved with HCC when I was 14-years-old.”

After graduating UCF in 2016, Marisela joined the Notre Dame Mission Volunteers AmeriCorps’ program and chose HCC as the volunteering site. At first she was clueless about Adelante Caminantes, but she states “When I learned what it was, I fell in love with the program.” Now, she is about to finish her second year.

When a new semester starts, Marisela waits for her fifty plus new caminantes at the sign-in desk and strives to learn their names right there and then. “I want them to feel they’re not just a face to me. They arrive extremely shy, so I want them to be comfortable and open up.”

She designed a curriculum for the English classes and set ten units of three to five lessons per level. “We talk about food, American money, events, daily activities, time, health. We want them to learn practical things, so they can apply them in real life.”

She shared an anecdote on how a police officer accused one of her students of stealing a bike while he was on his way to work. The minor partially understood what the officer said, showed him pictures riding his bike on his cell phone and the officer let him go. “It’s sad how they are snubbed just because of how they look or questioned because they’re suspicious of something.”

Marisela considers her volunteer work as a way to give back to the community who made her who she is: “I know how it feels when people assume you’re undocumented just by the way you look. I want to be the voice for those frightened kids and help them find their voice. I want to hear their stories on how they slept two nights in the desert or spend two days on a bus going unnoticed by Mexican officials to avoid deportation. I want people to ask ‘What is so bad in their country that they choose to leave everything they know to come here?’ Helping immigrants is like helping my family.”

Together We Are Stronger

The Sisters’ efforts are an inspiration to build community and join forces for a better present and future. Reality is only transformed when people unite to recognize shared difficulties and together overcome any wall blocking progress. Community leaders as Marisela are a testimony of how by giving our time, we can help others overcome their struggles and empower them for a better livelihood. A hand in times of need is a lever to stand up, carry on and fight for our dreams, for ourselves and for our well-being. Community is strength.