On The Green

On the Green: Northern Río Arriba Electric Cooperative Brings Together Youth and Golf

By Ariana Kramer

Ashley Tafoya

For the past 21 years, Northern Río Arriba Electric Cooperative has sponsored a Golf Camp for middle and high-school-aged students. It was originally started by Emery Maez, former general manager of the Co-op, and has continued to the present day. The one-day camp is usually held in April at Cattails Golf Course in Alamosa, Colorado. In addition, the Co-op holds a Golf Tournament open to the public in August each year. Money raised from the Golf Tournament is used to fund two scholarships of $1,000 each, which are awarded to graduating seniors.

“This is our way of giving back to the community,” says Executive Vice President and General Manager Anthony Mercure.

This year, the Golf Camp and Golf Tournament were canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, two high school seniors were chosen as recipients for the Northern Río Arriba Electric Cooperative’s scholarships: Ashley Tafoya and Faith Martinez. Both young women are graduates of Escalante Middle/High School in Tierra Amarilla. The school serves seventh through twelfth grades as part of the Chama Valley Independent Schools.

To apply for the scholarships, Tafoya and Martinez

Faith Martinez

each wrote an essay in response to the following prompt: “We’ve grown accustomed to having electricity on demand in the world we live in, such as clicking a remote control to turn on the TV, using a computer, playing video games, or charging our cell phones. Describe the impact on your life and community in a world without electricity.”

Martinez says the prompt encouraged her to start thinking about a world without electricity. She explored both the negative and positive outcomes of this in her essay.

“I hadn’t really thought about it before, and then when I read the question, it all came to me. I don’t think I had ever really thought about it—I had in some ways, but not in its entirety,” says Martinez.

Tafoya addressed the importance of electricity to our healthcare system.

“My dad is a high voltage lineman, so I have been prompted in the past to think about how important electricity is in our lives; however, the essay did prompt me to think further into detail about the healthcare system and how electricity has grown to be a very cardinal feature in healthcare facilities,” says Tafoya.

“Seconds matter when it means life or death, yet we never think of what electricity has given us in order to save lives. Without electricity, hospitals wouldn’t be able to have the equipment they need to save people’s lives and we wouldn’t have cellphones to call 911 when there is an emergency. We see hospitals and cellphones as conveniences in our lives and people don’t typically realize just how much these conveniences can affect our lives. Without electricity, we wouldn’t have the lifesaving technology that we all rely on today.”

– Ashley Tafoya

“Electricity is a vital part of millions of people around the world’s day to day life, including mine. It provides a lot of opportunities as well as tools that can be useful for almost anything including the simplest tasks. Personally, I wake up every morning and charge my phone, check emails on my computer and occasionally watch TV. All of this is done with the flick of a switch, however, if the flick of the switch were taken away, how would we react or know what to do?”

– Faith Martinez

Both Martinez and Tafoya were excited to learn that they had won this year’s scholarships for their essays. The scholarship funds will help support them as they begin their college educations. Martinez is attending Northern New Mexico College this fall to pursue both an associate’s and a bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education. Tafoya is attending New Mexico Highlands University this fall to study Business Management with a focus in Accounting.

Martinez says, “My end goal is to be a speech pathologist in the state of New Mexico. A few years ago, my mom had a stroke that left her pretty much unable to write or talk for a little while, so she had to do multiple speech therapy sessions. I became friends with the speech therapists. I saw what they were able to do for my mom, I saw what they did for her, and I thought if they changed my mom’s life to that extent, I would want to do that for someone else.”

As students in middle and high school, Martinez and Tafoya attended the Northern Río Arriba Electric Cooperative’s Golf Camp at Cattails Golf Course.

“I grew up golfing with my brothers every summer, and I really enjoyed being able to go out and golf with my friends and classmates,” says Tafoya. “We were able to go learn and, of course, have fun.”

“It gave everyone an experience to bond with each other outside of school,” says Martinez. “It taught me a new skill because I had never been golfing prior to that.”

Mercure explains the camp is designed to teach the fundamentals of golf. Cattails Golf Course staff lead the camp and take the students out to the driving range where they show them how to use their irons and explain the basics of the game.

Northern Río Arriba Electric Cooperative was incorporated on August 17, 1948, and energized in November 1949. The Co-op has 453 miles of line and serves 3,100 consumers in Río Arriba County.

For more information about scholarships and the golf camp, visit noraelectric.org or call the co-op at 575-756-2181.