The major minority

Take a drive to the east of College Park on Kenilworth Avenue, and it's difficult to go even a few blocks without seeing an ethnic eatery, a foreign food market or a business offering money transfer services to Latin America.

Cross over to University Boulevard, on the west side of College Park, and roll down the windows, and visitors are likely to be greeted with the smells of cooking pupusas (an El Salvadoran staple food), or the latest bachata tune to grace FM Spanish-language radio. Turn onto Riggs Road, and drivers can find more than 15 mobile kitchens offering everything from Jamaican patties to plantain snacks.

Welcome to Maryland's International Corridor, one of the biggest immigrant hubs this side of the Potomac River. It's all within arm's reach of College Park, and has largely sprung up only in the last 15 years, about the same period the university began its transformation as a top-50 national research institution. Although the areas have become vibrant ones, they've also become challenges to county officials and older, more established neighborhoods, including ones in College Park.

In such a small area like College Park, and the much smaller campus, it's difficult not to notice the impact. Although the university and College Park's demographics remained largely stagnant during the 1990s, the four areas surrounding the university increased in foreign-born residents by an average of 13 percent. In the western region, known as the incorporated area of Langley Park, nearly 65 percent of residents were born outside of U.S., according to the 2000 Census.

But the same neighborhood has drawn attention for its high crime rates, drug trafficking and prostitution rings. It's a vibrant, high-density area with about the same number of residents as College Park, but it's also indicative of the challenges the nation faces as a whole.

"I think the immigrant community in Prince George's is absolutely our most vulnerable population," said Maj. Kevin Davis, who commands the police district where many of the immigrant communities and College Park lie. "I think they're a huge asset to the workforce, to the culture, to the churches. They're very family-oriented people, and they're new to this country just like the Italian and Irish were at the turn of the 20th century."

Davis said North College Park neighborhoods are beginning to see some of the changes seen in surrounding areas, which sometimes can cause friction between some older, established black and white neighborhoods. In areas surrounding College Park, Davis said day laborers who often loiter on corners, overcrowded housing and sometimes gang issues can put residents at loggerheads.

"I can't tell you how many meetings I've had to referee between ... older black and white communities and the newer emerging Latinos," Davis said. His message? "Come on, let's reach out to those communities, the ones you call 'they' and 'them,' and come together." He added: "You can't police yourself out of it."

Although it's only been during the past few years, the university has increasingly reached out to the communities as it becomes clear that diminished social services and poverty issues are becoming looming problems not only facing the county, but the immigrants and the children themselves.

Several student groups have engaged in gang interventions, feeding at day laborer sites run by the immigrant advocacy group Casa de Maryland and tutoring at area schools faced with not only students from poor families but language issues as well. One undergraduate class, American Studies 498J: Popular Culture, Youth and Literacy, offers credit to students who help tutor both adults and high school students in the large foreign-born population around Hyattsville.

In December, outgoing Provost Bill Destler announced the launch of the Community Partners Program, billed as "an exciting new "seed" grant program designed to encourage and fund University-community partnerships."

"CPP grants will address critical needs in the communities surrounding the University of Maryland, College Park campus, with a special focus on low-income neighborhoods," Destler wrote. Adelphi, Langley Park, Hyattsville and Riverdale are among the communities of focus, he added.

The grant process is still in process, but The Engaged University - an initiative that is one of the most recent examples of the university's outreach to the community - will be administering the grants. Grant recipients will be announced next week.

[Editor's note: Read The Diamondback on Saturday and check the online edition www.diamondbackonline.com for the second installment of this series, which focuses on two of the most university's most visible initiatives in the surrounding community. The presentation will appear in print, as well as online in the debut of The Diamondback's multimedia projects.]

Staff writer Kevin Litten contributed to this report.

Contact reporter Arelis Hernandez at hernandezdbk@gmail.com