ELAS SEMILLA de UCLA
Previously known as MEChA Xinachtli
DOING IT FOR THE YOUTH SINCE 1998
ELAS SEMILLA: Supporting Empowerment through Mentorship and Inspiring Latine Liberation and Aspirations
ELAS SEMILLA is a student-run, student-initiated, and student-funded College & Career access project from UCLA. Our mission is to promote higher education and empower Latine communities by addressing and dismantling the barriers within the Chicane/Latine educational pipeline. We focus on raising socio-political awareness and fostering student leadership among Latine youth from local communities. Our dedicated staff consists of current UCLA students who are passionate about making a meaningful impact. For the 2024-2025 academic year, we are proudly partnered with, Animo Ralph Bunche Charter High School, Katella High School (AUHSD), and Lynwood High School (LUSD). SEMILLA staff visit our partner schools once a week, after school, providing high school students with peer advising, skill-building sessions, workshops, and engaging activities designed to support their educational and personal growth.
2025-2026 SEMILLA Update
SEMILLA is one of seven Student-Initiated Outreach Committee (SIOC) projects at UCLA. These projects are funded through the SIOC Committee, a body of undergraduate students who manage over $1.2 million in student fees. The SIOC Committee allocates these funds to support project operations, including staffing, transportation, food, supplies, printing, and programming at site visits and field trips. Since 1998, this funding structure has allowed SIOC projects to sustain outreach and community engagement efforts.
In recent years, students have become increasingly concerned about administrative changes that may impact the future of SIOC and CRC programs. Administrators have decided to undertake a comprehensive restructuring of both the 7 SIOC & 7 CRC Projects on campus, citing federal interpretations of DEI policy and Proposition 209 as the basis for reorganizing student-initiated outreach and retention projects.
As part of this restructuring, contracts for full-time project coordinators are set to end without renewal, and the hiring process for 2025–2026 student staff has been paused. Without coordinators and student staff, SEMILLA and other projects may not have the personnel needed to continue their programming at full capacity. Students are also worried about the long-term impact of losing this infrastructure, as it has supported critical outreach, site visits, and field trips for decades. The CRC Projects were established in 1988, and the SIOC Projects were established in 1998.
As of 8/31/25, SEMILLA has no full-time Project Coordinator and no staff hired for the 2025-2026 academic year. At this time, the outlook for the 2025–2026 academic year remains uncertain. SEMILLA may face significant limitations in its ability to serve partnered schools with our weekly site visits and quarterly field trips. Students are deeply concerned that without dedicated staff and resources, SEMILLA’s longstanding tradition of outreach and empowerment could be interrupted.
