With immigration reform on the horizon and a potential mandate that all immigrants speak English, a new dilemma arises: where can people learn English? ESL classes aren’t always available due to long waiting lists and state budget cuts.
Moreover, it’s been reported that only 39% of ESL students reach a proficiency that can advance them to the next level. Why? Because with work and family responsibilities, students rarely have the time to devote to a full course load.
The solution, Marisa Trevino proposes in a USA Today editorial, is teaching immigrants English at work, embracing a shared responsibility between employer and employees. Not only could the employer get a future tax break, they are training their employees in an essential skill necessary to perform their job. Case in point:
TV station WFAA found that hundreds of low-level commercial aircraft mechanics in Texas had the necessary skill set for the job, but they lacked the language skills to communicate with supervisors or to read repair manuals. The report prompted Congress to demand that by March, the Federal Aviation Administration require all mechanics to be proficient in English.
McDonald’s is also following suit. They’ve created a 22-week ESL program for entry level management workers. The classes combine onsite and virtual language learning. Trevino concludes:
McDonald’s has learned what many ESL programs already have confirmed: The will to learn English is there. Smart companies will follow suit. It’s a win-win-win situation for employer, employee — and country.
Every language comes with a unique set of sounds, which babies are able to distinguish long before they begin talking. But this ability to distinguish actually decreases by the time they start talking.
[Dr. Patricia] Kuhl offers an example: Japanese doesn’t distinguish between the “L” and “R” sounds of English — “rake” and “lake” would sound the same. Her team proved that a 7-month-old in Tokyo and a 7-month-old in Seattle respond equally well to those different sounds. But by 11 months, the Japanese infant had lost a lot of that ability.
And if you’re wondering how researchers can decipher sounds a baby detects, the article explains (primarily through toys and eye-gaze).
Monolingual kids tend to tune out words that don’t fit into the sounds they recognize, thereby creating a one-language pathway in the brain. Apparently, bilingual babies can absorb both languages at once, which seems to make bilingual babies’ brains more flexible.
The researchers tested 44 12-month-olds to see how they recognized three-syllable patterns — nonsense words, just to test sound learning. Sure enough, gaze-tracking showed the bilingual babies learned two kinds of patterns at the same time — like lo-ba-lo or lo-lo-ba — while the one-language babies learned only one.
Unfortunately, the brain’s language circuitry is mostly set up by age 7, making it difficult for older children and adults to learn a second language at the native level. But that doesn’t mean the window is forever closed.
Click here to read the full article, and how researchers want to tap into this same brain circuitry to help adults learn.
The study points to some strengths and weaknesses of Latino businesses, which occupy the largest percent of minority-owned businesses and therefore make a greater impact on the regional economy.
“Latino firms are in critical sectors of the economy, both traditional sectors that need to remain strong and entering new sectors like the green jobs sectors that are going to grow the regional economy,” said [Dr. J.R. DeShazo, Director of the Lewis Center in the UCLA School of Public Affairs].
One strength: Latino-businesses are more likely to offer a higher return on investment. One weakness: the Latino business sector lacks technical and banking assistance, which are both key to a business’s long-term growth. Latino businesses tend to be underserved by banking institutions and are more vulnerable when making banking decisions.
The study calls for more policy advocacy for Latino businesses.
While Latino political engagement has increased over the last decade, Latinos have not done as much in advocating for its business community, according to DeShazo. The lack of time and resources, as well as the lack of access to business associations in the region may be factors in the current state of Latino business people’s civic engagement, he says. “One of the most important things we can do as an organization is policy advocacy,” DeShazo said.
To read the full article and more about the study’s recommendations, click here.
A proposal for a public bilingual charter school failed to pass last week in Austin, Texas. The school was competing with five others for selection by the State Board of Education. Texas has capped charters in recent legislation due to some overspending since the first charter schools opened 10 years ago.
Austin Community School, the proposed school concept, would incorporate classes in both Spanish and English, with a stronger emphasis on Spanish in the earlier years, taught by instructors experienced in the International Baccalaureate program and dual-language education.
The goal of the Austin Community School is to offer a complete, well-implemented dual language program to all children of Austin, regardless of race or economic background, [Austin Community School board treasurer Lori] May said. There are no dual language programs in Austin outside of private schools, and many parents can’t afford to send their children to these schools.
The school would start with Spanish- and English-speaking children ages five to seven (kindergarten and first grade), and would add a grade each year. The school’s supporters cite research that children excel in school and have a lower drop-out rate when taught in a bilingual environment.
Supporters haven’t given up on the bilingual charter school proposal, and are looking for other opportunities and financing to push forward.
2007 saw 937 Hispanic worker deaths compared to 533 in 1992 (a 76% increase); nationwide, total fatalities have dropped in that time period (USA Today reports.) Texas alone reported 50 Hispanic workplace deaths last year.
While an increase of Hispanics in the general workforce has increased as well, it’s clear that there are other reasons causing the discrepancy. First, there’s the language barrier—workers who aren’t able to communicate important information to their supervisors, and vice versa, can miss important instructions that lead to accidents. Then, illegal workers are often exploited—not given proper safety tools for example, or are overworked.
Some more reasons cited:
Workers without legal documentation to be in the U.S. are less inclined to join a union, which helps protect workers, or protest when conditions seem dangerous, said Raj Nayak of the California-based National Employment Law Project. “They’re doing the most dangerous work for longer hours,” Nayak said.
The study used three groups of native English-speakers: English-Spanish bilinguals, English-Mandarin bilinguals, and English monolinguals. When each group was asked to master a set of words in an invented language that had no similarities to either Spanish or Mandarin, the two bilingual groups learned nearly twice as many words as the monolingual speakers.
Researchers think this adeptness translates to strengths in other types of language learning and verbal capacities.
The study has important implications for educators who are considering the appropriate age at which to introduce foreign language instruction as well as for parents who in increasing numbers have an option to enroll their children in dual language immersion programs.
“We’re seeing that exposure to two languages early in life carries far-reaching benefits,” said co-author Kaushanskaya. “Our research tells us that children who grow up with two languages wind up being better language learners later on.”
Despite the benefits of early childhood language instruction, some parents fear that a second language will distract or confuse their child. However, this article suggests that do bilingual children are actually better able to ignore irrelevant information than non-bilinguals when learning a second language.
This set of studies adds to comparable language acquisition research, some of which suggests that the onset of Alzheimer’s in bilinguals is delayed by four years compared to monolinguals.
An article by Arizonian Jack Dunning explains why Hispanics have been less affected by the recession than other non-Hispanic Americans. Using recent studies by Univision and the Pew Hispanics, he points to some results:
Just 45 percent of Hispanics carry credit cards compared to 71 percent for non-Hispanics. And even a lesser amount take out loans, only 34 percent versus 53 percent for non-Hispanics. They shop more frequently than non-Hispanics, take more brand prescriptions, and pay more attention to advertising.
With less credit cards and loans comes less debt. And because Hispanics are more likely to rent homes than to own (44% vs. 23%), they have been less affected by foreclosures.
All of these reasons might be why Hispanics are more optimistic about the state of the economy than non-Hispanics, and a reason why Hispanics are more willing to spend. Buying power for Hispanics is increasing at twice the rate of non-Hispanics, and it’s impossible for companies and advertisers not to take notice. Simply translating marketing materials (Hispanics are 38% more likely to buy from an advertiser than non-Hispanics [Index 131 to 95], according to Univision) will bring your business one step closer to accessing a powerful sector of the U.S. economy.
Even though Tom Zabkowski has lived in the United States for almost 20 years after immigrating from Poland, he struggles to lose his accent. What’s more, he believes it’s holding him back in job interviews.
Many people with foreign accents have recently been taking accent-reduction classes because they don’t feel that they are being understood, and are therefore less marketable. Accent-reduction coaches interviewed for the Tribune report say they’ve seen a recession-related increase in students.
Employment experts say it’s not just Zabkowski who’s putting in the effort to make himself clearer and more marketable — in this down economy, every advantage helps when applying for a job, and accent reduction is part of that.
Stephanie Bickel, who runs a speaking firm with six instructors in Chicago, says that some people are not coming in to reduce a foreign accent, but to change the tone of their voice to sound more professional. “There’s been a noticeable increase in [American] men and women seeking to lower the pitch of their voices,” Bickel said. “It’s a trend that seems to be recession-related.”
Some ex-employee whistle-blowers say that Bank of America ordered them to use their Spanish language skills to push immigrants into bank services they couldn’t afford.
“We were coached every day to push multiple checking accounts, credit cards and debit cards even when the customer didn’t understand how to use them,” said [former bank teller Gabby] Ornelas, who lives in Landover Hills, Md., a town with a large immigrant population and a per-capita income of less than $19,000.
The Service Employees International Union, who is trying to organize BOA, is backing Ornelas and eight of her colleagues as they address what they believe is unethical exploitation of Latino immigrants. They say that BOA’s business model encourages working-class customers to sign up for lines of credit with high interest rates and cash advance services, all meant to maximize charges and overdraft fees.
BOA, on the other hand, believes the union is misinterpreting the relationship they have with their customers. A rep said that the services are legal and useful to customers:
“We believe a checking account is the cornerstone to establishing financial security in this country,” [BOA spokesperson Anne] Pace said in an e-mail. “We offer innovative financial services to meet the needs of all of our customers, including Hispanic customers.”
