Hispanos Unidos is celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month by putting on events for students and the Abilene community to enjoy. 

The club held its annual Entra A La Plaza event Friday which featured food trucks, entertainment and raffles. 

Planning for the event started in the summer, with the Hispanos Unidos officers continuing to meet every Wednesday for the past five weeks. 

“We planned all the events and going over literally every detail,” said Dylan Cordero, nursing major and Hispanos Unidos president from Kaufman. “As far as maintenance coming and marking the sprinkler lines. It was very, very detailed.”

Cordero said there was a lot of coordinating with food trucks that had to be done as well. The event was even pushed back a week so that more food trucks were able to come. 

400 food vouchers were given away to students in a matter of just 30 minutes.

This year’s Entra A La Plaza event was held at the GATA Fountain area. Last year, it was held at the Rich Welcome Plaza and featured a performance by a Selena tribute band. This year the Selena tribute band performance will be held separately due to there being no power for the band to play at the Gata Fountain. 

“That was a big obstacle,” Cordero said.  “…do we want to move everything to just a piece of campus or do we still want to have it in the heart of campus?”

This year there were more events for kids from the community to enjoy as well. 

“I wanted to bring the bounce house and the petting zoo just because last year there were a lot of children around, and they didn’t have much to do,” Cordero said. “I felt like the bounce house, the petting zoo, even the face painting, it brings more people together.”

Victoria Haynes, senior biology major and Hispanos Unidos chaplain from Dallas, said it was really great to have the Abilene community at the event. 

“I think ACU is like a bubble in a sense,” Haynes said. “So, to have people from the community on campus is really great.”

Haynes and Cordero both stressed how grateful Hispanos Unidos is for their sponsors. 

“We’re really fortunate to have really great sponsors and support to pull things off like this.” Haynes said. “People that are not going to shoot our ideas down and do anything they can to make those things happen.”

Hispanos Unidos, along with The Office of Multicultural Affairs and The Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, will host its Bidi Bidi Banda event this upcoming Friday at 8 p.m. at the Hunter Welcome Center.