Alyssa Cole
Staff Writer
The Campus Activities Board brought awareness to Native American heritage month with a dream catcher event.
The event took place on Monday at Sneaky Park where students stopped by to learn about the history behind dream catchers as well as construct their own.
“I thought it was really well thought of, but they didn’t plan it well enough to supply dream catcher materials for everyone,” senior psychology major Monica Delgado said.
CAB had a display board with facts behind the craft as well as music for entertainment. They also encouraged students to make their own personal and unique dream catcher with the supplied kits.
“We provided 72 kits and they were all gone,” Ashley Cole, junior CAB multicultural chair, said.
Students had the option of crafting the standard dream catcher that could be hung by their bedside or a dream catcher keychain that would enable them to carry their dreams with them.
“I didn’t know there was a legend behind dream catchers before reading the poster,” Delgado said.
Dream catchers are an American Indian tradition that originated from the Chippewa tribe. Some Native Americans consider the tradition to be a symbol of unity.
The Chippewa believe dream catchers change a persons dream process. Good dreams will pass through a dream catcher, and nightmares will get tangled and go away with the light of the new day.
“I already knew what they were, but the display was helpful too,” sophomore physiology major Carolina Chavez said.
Traditional dream catchers are made from hooped grapevines and waxed rope. They repeat the same stitch from start to finish with a looping and linking process.
“I always like the CAB events (…) I like arts and crafts,” Chavez said.
Although Cole was happy with the turn out of the event, some students were upset that they were not able to participate in the event due to lack of kits provided.
The event was advertised to run from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. but by 11:30 a.m. all 72 of the kits had been taken.
CAB usually does a great job at item distribution, but perhaps they did not expect so many students to participate.
Hopefully CAB will keep this in mind for future events.
Alyssa Cole can be reached at alyssa.cole@laverne.edu.
