The Association of Latino Professionals for America, the longest-standing Latino organization in the United States, now has a sector at St.Thomas that includes students of various majors and ethnic backgrounds and aims to promote successful leaders.

ALPFA has more than 72,000 members and has 150 student chapters across the U.S. Club President Dylan Condé-Brooks, an entrepreneurship and marketing major, said ALPFA gives students a home to facilitate professional aspirations.

“A lot of the culture clubs do a great job of expressing the culture that our students have, but they don’t really have a home as far as the finding of a job, which, ultimately, is the end goal of why we’re in college,” Condé-Brooks said.

The association focuses on training students to be professional leaders and brings in representatives from companies such as Honeywell and Ameriprise. The club also educates its members on Latino-style management.

“Latino management style, it’s … built on kind of a respect,” Condé-Brooks said. “It’s not just about your title but what you’ve been doing for your members, and that’s really kind of the thing we embody at ALPFA. No one person is more important than anyone else.”

Although ALPFA includes “Latino” in the title, club member Julian Ocampo said the club tries to cater to all its members and communities.

“ALPFA is different from other clubs on campus because we want to support the Latino community, but we don’t limit our efforts to just Latinos.” Ocampo said. “That is why we want to build a good base of student attendants.”

Monica Hartmann, an economics professor and faculty adviser for ALPFA, said the association makes a conscious effort to establish a club open to everyone. In addition to promoting diversity, it promotes teamwork.

“During this time of today, in this environment, people really need to start thinking about that we all are one community,” Hartmann said. “We all need to work together.”

The club hopes to convey to members that giving back to the community contributes to the common good and that power in the workforce is not always necessary to do good things.

“When it comes to helping others, don’t wait until you’re older,” Hartmann said. “You can do that now because you have time and passion, and just give back to community in whatever way it is.”

Noura Elmanssy can be reached at elma7206@stthomas.edu.