At Camp Colectiva, immigrant students get a Minnesota summer camp experience

Viviana Fonseca Fuerez had been in Minneapolis less than three weeks when she came to pick up her children from Camp Colectiva last month. Her son and daughter were among a crowd of smiling kids who hopped off a bus at Theodore Wirth Regional Park, calling out to their parents, friends and counselors.

Fonseca Fuerez had learned about the summer camp from a WhatsApp group chat for newly arrived immigrant parents organized by Colectiva Bilingüe, a joint nonprofit organization for Minneapolis’ five public dual-immersion Spanish language schools. The camp aims to be a source of fun and community for newly arrived immigrant students in the Minneapolis Public Schools. Counselors are older students who have gone through the Spanish-immersion program.

The group ran its second annual Camp Colectiva this summer in conjunction with the Loppet Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes outdoor activities. The group returned to the Trailhead, Wirth Park’s large activities center, from an overnight summer camp experience in Excelsior to close out a week of outdoor activities and bonding as the school year approached. Some campers had only just arrived in the United States and are preparing to enter a new school in a new country.

Fonseca Fuerez came to Minnesota from Ecuador to join her brother, enduring a harrowing journey of long bus rides broken up by miles of walking that carried the family through Central America and Mexico to the U.S. “It was terrible, truly,” she said.

Now, she said, “We are going to stay here.”

Colectiva Bilingüe formed in 2020 after the Minneapolis school district passed the Comprehensive District Design measure, which sought to reorganize the district to minimize racial inequalities that persisted across the city.

After the redesign, Minneapolis offered Spanish dual-language programs at five schools: Andersen United Middle School; Emerson, Green Central and Las Estrellas elementary schools; and Roosevelt High School. Rather than divide resources among individual schools, parents formed Colectiva Bilingüe to function as a sort of parent-teacher organization, according to Molly Dengler, co-president of the Bilingual Education Collective. The group applies for grants and uses that money for programming.

Colectiva Bilingüe partnered last year with YMCA of the North to host about 25 kids for Camp Colectiva, which is funded by a No Child Left Inside grant from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. This year it partnered with the Loppet Foundation, which took 40 kids mountain biking, kayaking, orienteering and swimming.

It’s an important step to ensure immigrant families have access to the outdoors and the opportunity to have positive experiences in nature, Dengler said. The children can enjoy fun activities and meet new friends, while their parents bond with families in similar situations.

“It’s not just a benefit for the kids,” Dengler said.

The camp launched with a family day where parents were invited to join their children to canoe on the Mississippi River. The middle of the week featured various outdoor activities centered around the Trailhead at Wirth Park. Later, the group took a bus to Excelsior for an overnight stay at Camp Fire Minnesota.

Kaly Quinche said her 11-year-old son enjoyed mountain biking the most. Quinche, like most of the parents gathered at the Trailhead, is from Ecuador. Colectiva Bilingüe is seeing a large influx of Ecuadorian families, Dengler said, which matches Minnesota immigration trends. Nearly 90% of campers this year were Ecuadorian, she said.

Asylum cases originating from Ecuador skyrocketed by 900% in Minnesota’s immigration court in the past five years. The majority of newcomers began arriving in 2022, when conditions in Ecuador began to deteriorate. Several Minnesota cities, including Columbia Heights, Minneapolis and St. Paul, have called on the federal government to give Ecuadorians temporary protected status in the U.S.

Dengler brought together a group of camper parents to meet and get to know each other. All were from Ecuador, and most had arrived in Minnesota in the past two years. The assembled parents miss their home nation, and many lamented deteriorating conditions and rising violence that led them to seek a new life in the U.S. They miss the climate and the flavorful produce of home, but are making life work here. Quinche met another woman from the same small city, Cayambe, in the Andean highlands north of Quito.

Deysi Malan had two cousins living in Minneapolis when she moved to Minnesota 20 months ago from Quito. Now, most of her family is here.

“There are quite a few of us,” she said.

Malan’s 11-year-old daughter, who attends Las Estrellas in northeast Minneapolis, liked swimming at Camp Colectiva. She attended a non-dual immersion school when they arrived and was frustrated with the language gap, Malan said, but now she’s picking up English and is able to learn in her native language.

More than 2,500 new Spanish-speaking students enrolled in the Minneapolis school district last year, and many were not in dual-immersion schools, Dengler said. Dual-immersion schools are facing budget cuts, despite a waitlist at the district’s three Spanish language elementary schools.

The Colectiva Bilingüe WhatsApp group has helped people acclimate to life in Minnesota. Quinche said she’s used the group to find friends and even work opportunities.

“It’s helped us connect with lots of people,” she said.

About the partnership

This story comes to you from Sahan Journal, a nonprofit newsroom dedicated to covering Minnesota’s immigrants and communities of color. Sign up for a free newsletter to receive Sahan’s stories in your inbox.