Encuentros in the News

In 2003, Carlsbad citizen Ofie Escobedo looked across the room during a North County Times roundtable and asked the men in attendance (in a rough paraphrase): “We in the North County Latinas Association are working hard to help our young Latinas succeed in school. What are you doing for the boys?”

The men’s response was to form the volunteer group Encuentros Leadership of North San Diego County. Encuentros, which is Spanish for “coming together,” aims to increase the number of Latino boys getting into and successfully through college. The high school dropout rate for Latino boys is and has been roughly a staggering 50 percent.

In a push to encourage more Latino boys to stay in school and move on to college, school officials in Vista have expanded a motivational after-school program this year.

The Encuentros program was designed by a local nonprofit group to help Latino boys better define who they are, what they want out of life and how they can get it.

“I think we’re just planting the seed for success,” said David Prieto, who teaches the Encuentros class at Rancho Minerva Middle School. “We’re here to build leaders.”

Hundreds of young Latino men from North County middle and high schools descended upon MiraCosta College Saturday to attend workshops, demonstrations and motivational speeches by many prominent Latinos from business, educational institutions and government agencies.

The sixth annual daylong Encuentros Education & Career Exploration Conference was designed to help reverse the trend of low educational achievement among school-age Latino males by providing personal and professional counseling on what is required to succeed in today’s working world.

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