‘Empowering Hispanics’
Engineering organization helps UCF students grow personally, professionally
As a first-generation Mexican American student, Jazmine Manriquez started her college career feeling somewhat lost.
Manriquez, a UCF senior industrial engineering major, joined the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers her sophomore year, and it became her home at UCF that gave her the drive to reach her goals.
“SHPE was the one where I really honed in on what it meant to struggle, but struggle together and push to go to the next level,” said Manriquez, the organization’s president.
According to UCF’s College of Engineering and Computer Science website, UCF’s SHPE is the only engineering organization that targets the Hispanic community, and some Hispanic students credit it as a factor to their success.
In UCF’s undergraduate engineering programs, 1,434 students, or 30%, are Hispanic or Latino this semester, according to UCF’s Institutional Knowledge Management.
Manriquez said SHPE, which has over 300 members in the UCF chapter, focuses on helping students obtain mentorships, internships or jobs as well as creating a family in the large UCF community.
This year, it launched a scholarship committee for students who struggle financially, Manriquez said.
“As a Hispanic engineer, sometimes a number of us are either non-citizens, immigrants, or first generation,” Manriquez said. “In a way, you see it as role models with these mentorships or these other people where it’s like ‘You did it; I could do it, too.’ ”
UCF’s CECS includes nine undergraduate engineering programs: aerospace, civil, computer, construction, electrical, environmental, industrial, materials and mechanical. The photonics science and engineering degree is in the College of Optics and Photonics but is offered jointly with CECS.
Carlos Arboleda, a Colombian UCF ‘21 industrial engineering alumnus, was internal vice president for SHPE when his chapter met with the Alaskan chapter, and they collaborated for an event.
Arboleda, a former president of SHPE UCF, said despite being so far away, they made it work because it doesn’t matter where someone is from: if they are in SHPE, they are family.
SHPE benefits not only the Hispanic community but UCF as a whole, Arboleda said.
“The beauty of the Hispanic community is the grit that comes with it,” Arboleda said. “It’s ingrained to work hard, do what you can just because a lot of us, we may be first-generation, may come from immigrant backgrounds; we may be here on visas.”
Gonzalo Sauri, an 2018 mechanical engineering alumnus, saw SHPE as an organization of people who spoke the same language, had the same culture and customs and were pursuing the same dream: engineering. They were succeeding together.
When Sauri, a Peruvian American, was UCF’s SHPE president, the chapter hosted a Regional Leadership Development Conference. To host an RLDC, chapters must write a proposal, bidding against other universities.
The opportunity to host the conference made Sauri realize that SHPE had given him confidence, leadership and professional skills.
“Granted it was not me who did everything,” Sauri said. “But I felt confident that once we had a plan in place and the right people, you can make great things happen.”
For SHPE’s 2021 National Convention, Sauri was a recruiter for his company, Accenture.
“It’s just so fulfilling and wholesome that I’ve completely done full circle as getting a job at a SHPE national conference, and now I’m going to be a recruiter there,” Sauri said.
The SHPE National Convention is the “largest gathering of Hispanics in STEM every year” and consists of educational workshops, competitions, networking events and a career fair, according SHPE’s website.
This year was the convention’s 45th anniversary and was held in the Orange County Convention Center from Nov. 10-14.
For Manriquez, SHPE has helped her grow socially, academically and professionally and create a large network.
“I never really envisioned myself where I am right now,” Manriquez said. “Seeing how much of a difference this organization has made, I’m really hoping just to plant little seeds here and there to people to hopefully create larger accomplishments than they even thought they could.”