Rival universities, UTEP, New Mexico State University (NMSU) and Th e University of New Mexico (UNM) worked together to raise money to donate to an El Paso foundation to buy donations to go towards immigrants seeking asylum in El Paso. The sister school’s student governments had a goal to reach $30,000. With the help of the community, the fundraiser was able to bring back hope for migrants.
Rivals for Relief started due to the growing concern with Title 42 and the large groups of migrants coming to El Paso for asylum. Student Government Association President and international business major, Gabriela Muñoz, mentions how fundraising was brought up to her by the NMSU president, Garrett Moseley.
“He had this amazing project that he wanted to try to develop,” Muñoz said. “He would love to collaborate with UTEP as we are right here on the border.”
The mission of the fundraiser was to provide the necessities and essentials migrants need while preparing to start their new life. The associations wanted to bring awareness to the El Paso and New Mexico community.
The NMSU President connected with the Community Foundation of Southern New Mexico (CFSNM), which allowed the universities to create the fundraiser. Th rough CFSNM people from New Mexico and El Paso would not only be able to donate money to the cause but through this, the schools were able to strengthen their relationship by working on a large cause together.
“I think it was an amazing project just us being able to get together to give something back to the community, especially involving a humanitarian crisis,” Muñoz said.
The associations were able to share their experience with the humanitarian crises during this process. With this, many of the leaders shared their perspectives and understood each other’s views.
“We are impacted way differently than New Mexico is since they are a little further away,” Muñoz said. “For them, I guess it was just different seeing everything like on the news, on media, as opposed to everybody here in our El Paso Student Government Association that could see everything kind of unfolding in our own eyes.
“We believe that us as leaders of our institutions couldn’t sit back and let everything unfold,” Muñoz said. “We have to use our voices to advocate and to stand up for humanitarian rights.”
The fundraiser was completed on Feb. 17 with an amount of $2,115 raised in total. UTEP was able to raise $290, NMSU raised $1,790, and UNM raised $35.
The Foundation has not announced which El Paso foundation the money will be donated to. SGA hopes to continue projects with the sister universities in the future.
To learn more about future projects, UTEP SGA can be reached at sga.utep.edu and on Instagram @utepsga.
Avery Escamilla-Wendell is the staff reporter and may be reached at [email protected] or on Instagram @by_avery_escamilla.
