{"id":27587,"date":"2023-10-06T08:00:15","date_gmt":"2023-10-06T12:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/?p=27587"},"modified":"2023-10-06T10:10:40","modified_gmt":"2023-10-06T14:10:40","slug":"salvadoran-roots-help-senior-stay-grounded","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/salvadoran-roots-help-senior-stay-grounded\/","title":{"rendered":"Salvadoran roots help senior stay grounded"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hispanic Heritage Month at Furman<\/a>
\nRead more stories >><\/a><\/h4>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tony Galdamez \u201924 was born and raised in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, home to one of the largest Salvadoran populations in the United States. His parents met in the U.S. after leaving El Salvador in their teens.<\/p>\n

When asked why they came, Galdamaez said, almost matter-of-factly, \u201ccivil war.\u201d<\/p>\n

More than 1 million (about a fourth of the Central American country\u2019s population) were displaced by the Salvadoran Civil War of the 1980s. Hundreds of thousands sought safety in the U.S.<\/a>, and more than 200,000 Salvadoran Americans now live in the metro area around Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of my cousins live in Virginia and Maryland still,\u201d said Galdamez. \u201cA lot of my extended family are there. Only a few stayed in El Salvador.\u201d<\/p>\n

Staying relatively close to his family was one priority in the student\u2019s college search, and he knew what kind of academic environment would work best for him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was looking all around the East Coast for some place I could call home for four years,\u201d he said. \u201cI knew from high school that I prefer small classrooms<\/a> where I could get one-on-one time with the teachers. And one of my friends\u2019 mothers went to Furman, so I just gave it a shot, and then it worked.\u201d<\/p>\n

Seeking diversity, finding community<\/h3>\n

Coming from one primarily white institution to another was not too much of an adjustment for Galdamez, who was one of only three Latino students at his Episcopalian college prep school in the northern Virginia suburbs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been used to this since middle school,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve gotten used to my own skin. So I act the same way with everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, when he arrived at Furman, he was still hoping to connect with peers from diverse backgrounds.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t long before he was introduced to some of the members of the Hispanic Outreach and Latinx Awareness (HOLA<\/a>) student organization, which he now serves as vice president. He has savored the experience \u2013 in more ways than one.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust being able to talk about and try each other\u2019s foods \u2013 it\u2019s great,\u201d said Galdamez.<\/p>\n

He has also volunteered with Mosaic<\/a>, a group of students dedicated to creating a more diverse and inclusive student body by sharing their Furman experiences with high schoolers, and is co-president of Furman\u2019s club basketball team.<\/p>\n

As a health sciences major in the pre-health<\/a> program, Galdamez interned<\/a> in the Summer Program for Undergraduate Research in Surgery at Prisma Health. The aspiring physician assistant spent months shadowing surgeons and continuing his research into cholecystectomy (gall bladder removal) data.<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s good for all of Furman\u2019<\/h3>\n

During Hispanic Heritage Month, Galdamez, who visited El Salvador during spring break this year, is looking forward to the many events he is helping to plan as a member of the HOLA executive team.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not just for us in the Latino community,\u201d he said. \u201cI believe it\u2019s good for all of Furman to connect with multiple races and ethnicities.\u201d<\/p>\n

After growing up in Alexandria, Virginia, where Salvadorans are the largest Latino group, Galdamez acknowledged occasionally feeling \u201clike a minority\u201d among Furman\u2019s other Hispanic students. But he has still found a community he can relate to \u2013 mostly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe one thing that separates us is when they play music I don\u2019t like,\u201d laughed Galdamez, a fan of the classic Salvadoran songs he heard back home as well as the modern electronic sounds of reggaet\u00f3<\/em>n popularized in Panama and Puerto Rico.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

During Hispanic Heritage Month, Tony Galdamez \u201924 brings a Central American perspective to Furman\u2019s Latino community. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":265,"featured_media":27585,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[70,21,30],"tags":[1120],"class_list":["post-27587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-diversity-equity-and-inclusion","category-health-sciences","category-top-stories","tag-hispanic-heritage-month"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}