On 30 October 2017, faculty and students returned to school at the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez (UPRM) after 6 weeks of the devastation caused by hurricane Maria. It also marks Day 40 after the impact of this category five cyclone that made landfall in our country. The campus was full of students, which was very encouraging and motivating, especially if we consider that many of them have lost their homes. To add to this precarious situation, many continue to struggle to meet their basic needs, which include access to food and potable water. We would like to give you a brief account of our experiences before and after coming back to school so that you have a better perspective of our current situation at UPRM.

Maria was a category four hurricane with winds of 180 miles per hour. Our entire country lost access to any means of communication. One local AM radio station became the link among individuals, their families, and the outside world. Because of this lack of access to the outside world via phone, many of us drove through very dangerous roads to reunite with our families and loved ones. There were roads that could not be crossed for weeks, bridges that collapsed, and countless other changes to our landscape. Some hospitals had to shut down as a consequence of the island blackout and a lack of diesel to run their generators. We lost access to running water and electricity. Even as we write this, only 30% of the entire country has electrical power restored and 70% have running water. To this day, we are still not sure how many Puerto Ricans lost their lives due to this hurricane. The official number officially reported by the government is 64, yet local and international newspapers reported that 911 bodies were cremated without an autopsy. Some of the natural causes of death reported by hospitals were lack of oxygen and insulin or issues related to dialysis treatment, which were difficult to get at the time. This issue and the inconsistencies reported by the government regarding the cause of death of many Puerto Ricans after the hurricane continues to be a major controversy due to discrepancies between funeral homes and official government reports. Dealing with the ports and distributing food and water to rural areas and here on the west coast was also a challenge. For a while, those of us on the west coast of the island did not receive any kind of help from anyone outside of our communities. We as a community started clearing our roads and helping our neighbors without any outside assistance. Yet, 40 days after the hurricane, the chaotic situation on the island continues to revolve around lack of potable water and electricity. 

View from the rural area of Lajas, PR.

We were asked to report to work 2 weeks after the hurricane to report any damage to university property and to help with the cleanup. Three weeks later, the university was ready to receive the students. Our classrooms this time were very different than the ones where we had received our students 6 weeks earlier. The stories were as heartbreaking as you could expect after such a devastating natural disaster. One of our students had to ride out the storm in the bathroom of her house in a rural town in the center of the island. Another student had to pick a few belongings and rush out of their home because the flood was imminent. As we heard the stories, we realized that we have all been through a very traumatic chain of events that did not stop after the hurricane was over. In fact, this is when much of the trauma began. The Puerto Rico we knew has been erased and a new reality set in. This reality was both tangible and frustrating. On one hand, we had our landscape changed: everything from bridges collapsing to lack of any sort of communication to lack of access to the most basic human needs. On the other hand, our new reality and how to adjust to returning to college after everything we have experienced individually and collectively posed a major challenge. So, after shedding a few tears, we started discussing what was yet to come and how students felt once they returned to the university. All of a sudden, their eyes lit up and they started talking about how happy they were to see and hug their university friends. They were also content when they found out that many of their housing areas had running water and electrical power. Many even welcomed the structure of university activities, which gave us the sense of normalcy that we all need.

Students strategize crossing the provisional bridge in Morovis.

Current Challenges

The University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez has students from all over the island as well as from countries around the world. Although our campus is currently one of the very few places in Puerto Rico with electrical power and potable water, students and professors face other challenges. Access to communication has presented a major challenge for all of us as we return to school 40 days after the storm. Students have lost their personal belongings in many cases and do not have enough money to eat or for other expenses. Yet through this ordeal, we stand strong together. The university community continues to support the student community through different local initiatives and by accepting donations in the form of food, clothing, and money. These grassroots initiatives ensure that students get the help they need to continue their studies this semester while maintaining an acceptable quality of life.

Students cross a rockslide to deliver supplies.

Ways to Support Our Students

We have some initiatives that are not only reliable, but also effective at channeling and delivering all donations directly to students and the community. These are also community-based projects that are doing all they possibly can to get food and water to our students and the surrounding communities. Here are some things you can do if you wish to help us.

Support UPRM Come Colegial. This organization is solely dedicated to providing food assistance in the form of hot meals and groceries for our students in need. Out of 13,000 students, we had approximately 60 students registered before Hurricane Maria. After the hurricane, the organization received more than 800 formal requests from students, and it continues to get additional requests every day.

Donate to local organizations and grass root movements that will ensure those who need help the most will receive it in a timely manner. Non-profit organizations are the most effective way of ensuring that your donations go directly to those in needs. Besides Come Colegial and other local organizations, La Brigada Solidaria del Oeste is providing help for other needs that are not limited to food. This organization is also a grassroots movement and it includes members of the community, professors, and local philanthropists. At this time, La Brigada is helping by collecting clothes, medication, and other items for our community, including UPRM students. This organization is committed to delivering all donations directly and to rebuilding these communities.

Suggested donations include water filters, batteries, clothes, and canned food. Both organizations are also accepting monetary donations. You may also contact the student council and their board for additional information regarding our student population and their initiatives. If you wish to contact these organizations, the links and additional contact information are at the end of this article.

Allow and provide Puerto Rican students with opportunities to participate in research and other educational initiatives in your institutions. One way to help Puerto Rican students is to provide them with spaces where they can grow professionally. At this time, one of those initiatives is the collaboration between Penn State University, Great Allegheny Campus and the Department of English at UPR Mayagüez. This collaboration will allow ten students from the English Department to visit PSU Great Allegheny Campus next semester and conduct research while taking courses in that institution. These initiatives will not only further their education, but will also provide a new perspective that they can share when they return to UPRM to finish their studies.

Students and professors get ready to visit the town of Morovis.

A Word of Hope

We as a community composed of faculty and students in our ESL courses at UPRM finished the first day of classes by discussing new plans for our courses with a new set of activities and goals for the semester. We will now write our stories to discuss narrative writing as a venue to reflect on our lived experiences. While we continue to recover from our collective grief, we will also work on a project-based unit in which we will have class groups develop proposals on how to help others by providing concrete ideas to solve a community problem and to imagine the future we want. We as a language learning community in the Department of English at UPRM will continue to learn from the past and make the necessary changes to have the future we envision for our university and Puerto Rico at large. We also hope you join us in our efforts.

Links

To contact the Student Council at UPRM, you may call +1 787.832.4040 ext. 3409 or reach out via email at cge@uprm.edu. You may also visit their Facebook page.

To donate to Come Colegial, you may contact Ms. Lucy Serrano at lucy.serrano@upr.edu or via phone at +1 787.832.4040 ext. 3809. You may also visit their Facebook page.

To for further information regarding Brigada Solidaria del Oeste, you may visit their Facebook page.

Rosita L. Rivera, PhD, is a tenured professor in the Department of English at the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez. She teaches ESL and applied linguistics courses. She also teaches and collaborates with the Graduate TESOL Certificate and the online TESOL Certificate, and coordinates Project ITSLA for international students at UPRM.

Edward Contreras, MAEE, is an instructor in the Department of English at the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez and a PhD candidate at the University of South Florida.