Between trips to some local restaurants and passing by the park in Ambler I had begun to feel that I had a pretty good understanding of the diversity of the community. I knew for instance that there is a very prevalent population of Italians from Calabria, I knew that there is a Korean man who came to the US from Guatemala, there is an Albanian at a pizza shop, a man who delivers pizza at another pizza shop, and some Mexicans that I have spoken with on occasion around town primarily from Puebla (Poblano).
When it was asked to me to choose a culture within this community I chose the Mexican population due to the fact that I used to live in Mexico, and I figured that they were pretty much the only significant Hispanic group in Ambler. After completing this project I can now look back on my sampling of the culture in Ambler and tell that my sampling of the culture in Ambler just barely skimmed the surface.
After spending the time to do some research on what I thought was specifically going to be about the Mexican population in Ambler I couldn’t help but learn more about the communities of the folks mentioned above. I quickly discovered through interviews and community service that although the breadth of the immigrant community is primarily Poblano the depth of the community’s infrastructures lies heavily on a web of amity and collaboration amongst immigrant families.
St. Joseph’s is a Catholic church in Ambler located in the adjacent neighborhood to the main drag, Butler Pike. The neighborhood consists of primarily cottage-style row houses near the church and beginning a couple of blocks away twins and single-family Italian revivals. The neighborhood is diverse, lower-income, African-American, white, and Hispanic. For the most part the neighborhood seems pretty quiet. Although, I have called the police to report threatening language towards my wife and me by two young African-American males on bikes after they would not move from the roadway, and I have called when a group of mixed race adolescents were behaving aggressively around my daughter and I while playing at the jungle gym.
In Moll’s Funds of Knowledge we discussed in class the need to be directly involved with the community in order to understand the student as a “whole person.” If the student goes to the Korean’s store and has an Italian-American and an African-American family on either side of his row house then there is bound to be some spheres of activity in common with these groups. Furthermore, to explore the impulse to stereotype and challenge this tendency will also expand my awareness of the cultural diversity in Ambler.
I have to be careful in my learning about the diversity of Ambler not to reinforce any negative assumptions I had. “The quality of the data gathered and the conclusions and inferences drawn are influenced by the perceptions and values of the teacher involved in the inquiry,” states Etta Hollins when discussing the ethics of data collection. Although on the surface my prejudice toward not Hispanics would not affect my data, given the aforementioned diversity of the area and the fact that according Hollins, we are doing the research to improve classroom teaching, I need to move beyond any ills I judge in the neighborhood to find better ways of reaching out.
Community Service: Tutoring ESL
Juan (psueonym)
Juan is from Mexico City, he is a cook. In Mexico, he tested out of what amounts to the equivalent more or less to the first two years of high school in order to work in restaurants in Mexico City.
I have built a lot of trust with Juan most remarkably he was willing to write his story about arrival to the US for me. The sample comes from an email exchange and has not been altered from its source:
hola mi nombre es gabriel te narrare la historiade mi cruzada para los estados unidos nunca imagine que fuera tan peligroso ese dia lo recuerdo muy bien porque un dia antes no pude dormir pensando en que pasaria al siguiente dia amanecio y yo tenia nostalgia, pero tambien emocion por conocer otro pais, otras culturas, nuevas personas,nuevo lenguaje y lo mas importante quitarme la imagen de los americanos que muchos cuentan. bueno pues me despedi de mi familia, y con el llanto en los hojos. dila vuelta y aborde el avion que me trasbordo hasta ciudad juares donde la frontera de EU. y mex. se encuentran juntas caminamos tres dias, dormimos en el desierto y despues llegamos a texas donde vivi dos meses y no encontre trabajo un amigo me ayudo para trasladarme a philadelphia y vivi con el
un año lo, ahora tengo un trabajo, y tambien pues vivo bien lo cual estoy muy agradecido con este pais, pero no descarto un poco la descriminacion en personas que no saben nuestra realidad o nuestra istoria
I have heard many stories in my travels about how people have made their way into the US. However, seeing the story written is powerful motivation to drop deeply-rooted feelings of implied deviance and made me at least understand more of his sacrifice.
Perhaps, in some form my uneasiness comes from what we have called in class a “clash or bump” of cultures. I have had many opportunities to experience first hand a Hispanic experience by living, working and traveling in and amongst Hispanics. The slight change that I have witnessed in my own perspective from Juan’s writing and the aforementioned fact of my life experience allows me to have more empathy or, as we discussed in class, at a more subtle form of cultural awareness. Zhang a scholar in Sino-English Teacher research makes an important point that I believe augment our discussion.
Saint Joseph’s Church, Observing ESL Volunteers
I have also done some preliminary service work at St. Joseph’s Parish in Ambler. For all practical purposes I have not forgone any substantial service to the Church that meets the 5 hours needed. However, I have done my part in reaching out as an advocate to members of the Spanish-speaking community by handing out pamphlets that advertise for the classes. I have met and interviewed the organizer for the language classes and two of its students, to whom I will refer later. I have also done a lot of networking with community members to sample people’s attitudes towards starting a youth soccer team this Fall.
St. Joseph’s Parish is currently undertaking a program to assist in the language development of the Hispanic population in Ambler. All of the people working for the English language program are volunteers. Mauri is directing the small amount of funding the program has and coordinates the volunteers. Mauri has done some teaching, but has no TEFL experience in an official capacity and none of the volunteers are teaching professionals. However, the church is a central part of the Hispanic community due to the large segment of Hispanics that are Catholic, but the church does not offer Spanish mass nor hears confession in Spanish. The works done in the ESL classes, as far as I can tell, are done out of pure empathy and the need to reach out to Catholic members of the community not actively part of the parish.
Interviews
In the process of my initial investigation of the deeper levels of Mexican culture and preparation for interviews I discovered for myself a genuine camaraderie between Spanish-speaking immigrants. As it turns out, there is a large number of Costa Ricans in Ambler, there is at least on family of Peruvians, and some Puerto Ricans. In the following interviews I have tried to generate a fairly broad spectrum and I have tried to create some depth by interviewing working members of the community, a volunteer advocate, and an education professional in charge of a transitional bilingual program at LaSalle.
Mauri
Mauri is the organizer/director of the St. Joseph’s program in Ambler. She believes that the ESL learners that come to meet her core of volunteers are there to access basic level English. She believes that the program is designed to help people assimilate to the US.
Many of her benefactors are parents that want a better life for their children, specifically to go to a University. Students who come are not assessed for academic literacy in Spanish and are “analyzed” prior to classes so that they can be given the appropriate level textbook.
The textbook itself has directions in Spanish, but moves towards less and less as the textbook advances to higher levels. Mauri expressed some concern over the fact that Spanish is used referring to her idea that English classes should not be engaging students in their first language.
The challenges to the program are attrition and family matters. Most students have young children. St. Joseph’s does offer baby sitting in the same room for students. These same challenges lead to inconsistencies in the program and appropriate follow through of coursework like assessment and continuity of material is lost in the shuffle.
She has never heard of any authorities in Ambler harassing the Hispanic population or problems with town or school officials. Mauri has attempted to contact the school district on many occasions to let the administration know about the program, but she hasn’t heard a word back from them. It is her suspicion that the district is afraid of being held liable in case of some unknown event.
Gerardo
Gerardo is a 60 year old from Peru who has been in the country for 10 years. In Peru he was a commercial fisherman. Upon arriving on a tourist visa with his family, they decided to stay. Gerardo said that although they were making a decent salary in Peru, he wanted his children to have the opportunity to learn English and learn at a US university. His son is now 20 and is studying on a scholarship to Bucknell University. His daughter is 26, has a BA and is working.
Gerardo believes that it is the role of the classroom teacher to get the most out of the students. He believes that many immigrant parents want their students challenged and they in turn support whole-heartedly the good intentions of the school system. He believes that the system did his children well and that there was never a problem matriculating in the school system nor any mal intent on behalf of any teacher.
Gerardo’s biggest challenge has been the ongoing ordeal caused by his lack of papers. When asked if he wants the US to be his final resting place he said yes, because he has made a home here, but would be just as content to live out his days in Peru. He hopes that is son will be able to support him.
Being from Peru has not been a disadvantage for finding work or finding local resources from the Hispanic community. He feels that the connection between Hispanic community members involves more the Spanish language than country of citizenship. He has not felt singled out by police or other governmental authorities nor by the school district. However, he states that most of the exploitation comes from within the community in the form of undercutting bids and not paying market price for labor.
Jaime
Jaime is a 20 year-old Mexican from Puebla. He has come to Ambler to live with his five brothers. They are involved with various labor jobs, Jaime works at the laundry mat. Upon first sight Jaime seems a little different than many immigrants. He is soft spoken, speaks without a heavy dialect of Spanish. The reason he says he is perceived a little different is because he studies computer technology and has a long history of playing computer games. In fact the reason he has come to the US is to study computer science with the possibility of going home to teach.
Unfortunately for Jaime upon arriving when he just turned 17 he got the wrong information from a Colombian friend of a friend about matriculation into school and missed his opportunity to receive formal classes. Not until this interview did he find out that he would have been eligible to attend the high school.
He believes that there is a lot of support within the community and believes that this is the strength of the community. In fact, he believes that if you were to come to this country without knowing anyone you would be able to find plenty of support within the culture. These days a friend of a friend of a friend is staying with them who just arrived from Mexico. On the flip side he believes that because of not having appropriate paperwork or understanding how things work in education he is frustrated with his progress thus far in the US.
Nick Coggins (son in law of Mauri McKey)
ESL teacher/ coordinator for BUSCA at LaSalle University
http://www.lasalle.edu/schools/sas/busca/
BUSCA is a program at LaSalle University dedicated to assist Latino ESL students have the opportunity to advance from ESL or bilingual into the undergraduate level. It is a five semester transitional associates degree program intended for Latino students with a high school diploma or a GED. The group is 100% ESL with intense Grammar and writing during the first year. As the students progress adjunct content area professors teach various content area courses to prepare the students for a channeled 3rd year of university undergraduate work.
The ESL courses are usually compartmentalized Grammar, composition, and university studies. The university studies component is designed specifically to teach students about the presentation of material and professional standards of investigation and academia. The second semester is the beginning of a general core curriculum which English still part.
The role of Spanish is critical in the curriculum. Even in the ESL classes there is a fair amount of communication in Spanish to clarify instructions as well to help clarify narration and brainstorming ideas. There are no ESL teachers who are also content area teachers. However, about half of the content teachers are bilingual in content area classes of Computer Science, Math, and Biology are taught in Spanish.
Teachers value the cultures of classroom especially in the beginning levels of the program students share many aspects of their lives’ similarities and differences through dialogue and narratives.
Students at the beginning of the program tend to have more formative assessments alongside oral testing, portfolios, and papers instead of major exams. Teachers at this level try to help students identify repeated errors.
.
The teachers in the BUSCA program are dynamic that understand good teaching principles, and have a great deal of empathy. Teachers essentially create IEP’s for each student so that he or she will find success. One-third of the applicants are weeded out through assessment, but the L2 range is level 2-4 for the majority of students.
The program recently began a summer course designed to build grammar skills in Spanish. The class is not for credit; however, it has become popular amongst students due to the measure of their writing success after taking the course.
Many students are very motivated. Of the 19 graduates from last year’s program all are currently enrolled in a LaSalle undergraduate major. Many also have to take care of some family member at home or are a parent. One of the challenges of the program is the large amount of women that get pregnant during the 5 semesters. At one point there seems always to be no less than 10 pregnant women enrolled. However, all tend to complete the coursework.
Future coursework is being added. It will be call a “Capstone course,” dedicated to getting BUSCA students more ready culturally for the academia. Capstone courses work particularly on presentations, professional skills, and academic culture. It will help students become advocates for themselves, fully participating in the college process.
He would also like to see this program extended into other universities. Temple Ambler would be a great place to run something similar, as well as Montgomery County Community College. He feels that LaSalle is not meeting the needs to Mexican immigrants and would like to make more contact.
Su
Su is a business owner of a small convenience store who is native Korean. He is 50 years old and moved to Guatemala when he was 28 to teach Tae Kwon Do. After having a street fight with some men who were harassing him with racial slurs at a local restaurant in Guatemala he moved to the US with his Guatemalan wife. Upon entering the US he made contact with Koreans seek appropriate funds, and was able to get on his feet. He has had the store now for 10 years. He has two children and is very happy with the way that they have been treated by the school district.
As a Korean he has a different perspective on his status within the Hispanic community. However, says that he is proud to be an integral part. In fact, his store is frequented by Hispanics, African-Americans, and Whites from the local area. He says that he does not feel prejudice and does not feel stereotyped or exploited in any way.
Su believes that anyone who comes to this country to work hard should be treated equally, but realizes that it should be just as important to learn English and get an education.
Reflections
Overall my perceptions of the community of immigrants in Ambler have deepened. Although I was, in my opinion, more informed about some of the goings-on than most, I have a sense more of the some of the intricate framework that makes up the support structure for Hispanics in Ambler. The perspectives of the people I interviewed were varied, but seemed to follow a similar vein. All felt comfortable in the community of Ambler, and in general in the US. However, there is the underlying concern of not having immigration documents. At no point did anyone ever use the phrase illegal, which so often is used by the media, only undocumented. Regardless of this status, most felt safe with the local authorities. However, there does not seem to be much understanding of the greater support that is available to them. For example, children are not signed up for local soccer leagues, and the church membership is not high although many in the community consider themselves Catholic.
One insight that was opened to me through Jaime was the fact that people sometimes enter the US without any understanding of the legal opportunities they have an in his case close. Jaime seems sharp, and I can’t help but imagine the education that he missed by being misinformed.
Speaking with the volunteers at St. Joseph’s opened me up to the good intentions of a sorely needed ESL program in the area. Nonetheless, I do not question their motives, but have some concerns about the hidden agenda of assimilation. In reality its probably just semantics on this level but given the Crawford articles discussed in class its not a bad idea to be critical of good intentions. Yet, from what I have witnessed in no transparent way in the classroom does the St. Joseph’s program not respect diversity.
I don’t diverge much from the literature or the discussions that we have had in class. In fact, I seem to find myself as a trumpet for much of the rhetoric. I have more understanding of the implications of exterior forces such as the dominant hidden curriculum and some very oppressive histories involved with the status involuntary minorities. However, I cannot come to any specific conclusions on why the Mexican immigrant or for that matter Hispanic immigrants that have come to this country voluntarily have not met the standards for this status that Ogbu, for example, has stressed.
In sum I believe that this project has positively affected the manner in which I might go about teaching in the future. From what I have learned there is definitely a need to go deeper into understanding the value of the culture from which a student comes. I found that by simply walking through the park and introducing myself as a teacher that is interested in the community, I have always been met with respect and courtesy. Even if I were not to interview by the guidelines of Hollins’s RIQ, by at least understanding more of the cultural history and identifying some key support systems of the community I will better be able to teach. Specifically, I have a better understanding of the cultural capital and can better utilize Moll’s Funds of knowledge.
1. Zhang, Yn-li,(Dec. 2007) Ctitique on the Four Levels of Cross-Cultural Awareness. Sino-US English Teaching (Vol. 4 No. 12)
2. Hollins, E (2008) Culture in School Learning (2nd edition) Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates
3. Ogbu, J.U. (2004) Understanding Cultural Diversity and Learning. In J.A. Banks and C.A. McGee Banks, Handbook of Research on Multicultural Education (ppp582-593). Sand Francisco: Jossey-Bass
When it was asked to me to choose a culture within this community I chose the Mexican population due to the fact that I used to live in Mexico, and I figured that they were pretty much the only significant Hispanic group in Ambler. After completing this project I can now look back on my sampling of the culture in Ambler and tell that my sampling of the culture in Ambler just barely skimmed the surface.
After spending the time to do some research on what I thought was specifically going to be about the Mexican population in Ambler I couldn’t help but learn more about the communities of the folks mentioned above. I quickly discovered through interviews and community service that although the breadth of the immigrant community is primarily Poblano the depth of the community’s infrastructures lies heavily on a web of amity and collaboration amongst immigrant families.
St. Joseph’s is a Catholic church in Ambler located in the adjacent neighborhood to the main drag, Butler Pike. The neighborhood consists of primarily cottage-style row houses near the church and beginning a couple of blocks away twins and single-family Italian revivals. The neighborhood is diverse, lower-income, African-American, white, and Hispanic. For the most part the neighborhood seems pretty quiet. Although, I have called the police to report threatening language towards my wife and me by two young African-American males on bikes after they would not move from the roadway, and I have called when a group of mixed race adolescents were behaving aggressively around my daughter and I while playing at the jungle gym.
In Moll’s Funds of Knowledge we discussed in class the need to be directly involved with the community in order to understand the student as a “whole person.” If the student goes to the Korean’s store and has an Italian-American and an African-American family on either side of his row house then there is bound to be some spheres of activity in common with these groups. Furthermore, to explore the impulse to stereotype and challenge this tendency will also expand my awareness of the cultural diversity in Ambler.
I have to be careful in my learning about the diversity of Ambler not to reinforce any negative assumptions I had. “The quality of the data gathered and the conclusions and inferences drawn are influenced by the perceptions and values of the teacher involved in the inquiry,” states Etta Hollins when discussing the ethics of data collection. Although on the surface my prejudice toward not Hispanics would not affect my data, given the aforementioned diversity of the area and the fact that according Hollins, we are doing the research to improve classroom teaching, I need to move beyond any ills I judge in the neighborhood to find better ways of reaching out.
Community Service: Tutoring ESL
Juan (psueonym)
Juan is from Mexico City, he is a cook. In Mexico, he tested out of what amounts to the equivalent more or less to the first two years of high school in order to work in restaurants in Mexico City.
I have built a lot of trust with Juan most remarkably he was willing to write his story about arrival to the US for me. The sample comes from an email exchange and has not been altered from its source:
hola mi nombre es gabriel te narrare la historiade mi cruzada para los estados unidos nunca imagine que fuera tan peligroso ese dia lo recuerdo muy bien porque un dia antes no pude dormir pensando en que pasaria al siguiente dia amanecio y yo tenia nostalgia, pero tambien emocion por conocer otro pais, otras culturas, nuevas personas,nuevo lenguaje y lo mas importante quitarme la imagen de los americanos que muchos cuentan. bueno pues me despedi de mi familia, y con el llanto en los hojos. dila vuelta y aborde el avion que me trasbordo hasta ciudad juares donde la frontera de EU. y mex. se encuentran juntas caminamos tres dias, dormimos en el desierto y despues llegamos a texas donde vivi dos meses y no encontre trabajo un amigo me ayudo para trasladarme a philadelphia y vivi con el
un año lo, ahora tengo un trabajo, y tambien pues vivo bien lo cual estoy muy agradecido con este pais, pero no descarto un poco la descriminacion en personas que no saben nuestra realidad o nuestra istoria
I have heard many stories in my travels about how people have made their way into the US. However, seeing the story written is powerful motivation to drop deeply-rooted feelings of implied deviance and made me at least understand more of his sacrifice.
Perhaps, in some form my uneasiness comes from what we have called in class a “clash or bump” of cultures. I have had many opportunities to experience first hand a Hispanic experience by living, working and traveling in and amongst Hispanics. The slight change that I have witnessed in my own perspective from Juan’s writing and the aforementioned fact of my life experience allows me to have more empathy or, as we discussed in class, at a more subtle form of cultural awareness. Zhang a scholar in Sino-English Teacher research makes an important point that I believe augment our discussion.
Saint Joseph’s Church, Observing ESL Volunteers
I have also done some preliminary service work at St. Joseph’s Parish in Ambler. For all practical purposes I have not forgone any substantial service to the Church that meets the 5 hours needed. However, I have done my part in reaching out as an advocate to members of the Spanish-speaking community by handing out pamphlets that advertise for the classes. I have met and interviewed the organizer for the language classes and two of its students, to whom I will refer later. I have also done a lot of networking with community members to sample people’s attitudes towards starting a youth soccer team this Fall.
St. Joseph’s Parish is currently undertaking a program to assist in the language development of the Hispanic population in Ambler. All of the people working for the English language program are volunteers. Mauri is directing the small amount of funding the program has and coordinates the volunteers. Mauri has done some teaching, but has no TEFL experience in an official capacity and none of the volunteers are teaching professionals. However, the church is a central part of the Hispanic community due to the large segment of Hispanics that are Catholic, but the church does not offer Spanish mass nor hears confession in Spanish. The works done in the ESL classes, as far as I can tell, are done out of pure empathy and the need to reach out to Catholic members of the community not actively part of the parish.
Interviews
In the process of my initial investigation of the deeper levels of Mexican culture and preparation for interviews I discovered for myself a genuine camaraderie between Spanish-speaking immigrants. As it turns out, there is a large number of Costa Ricans in Ambler, there is at least on family of Peruvians, and some Puerto Ricans. In the following interviews I have tried to generate a fairly broad spectrum and I have tried to create some depth by interviewing working members of the community, a volunteer advocate, and an education professional in charge of a transitional bilingual program at LaSalle.
Mauri
Mauri is the organizer/director of the St. Joseph’s program in Ambler. She believes that the ESL learners that come to meet her core of volunteers are there to access basic level English. She believes that the program is designed to help people assimilate to the US.
Many of her benefactors are parents that want a better life for their children, specifically to go to a University. Students who come are not assessed for academic literacy in Spanish and are “analyzed” prior to classes so that they can be given the appropriate level textbook.
The textbook itself has directions in Spanish, but moves towards less and less as the textbook advances to higher levels. Mauri expressed some concern over the fact that Spanish is used referring to her idea that English classes should not be engaging students in their first language.
The challenges to the program are attrition and family matters. Most students have young children. St. Joseph’s does offer baby sitting in the same room for students. These same challenges lead to inconsistencies in the program and appropriate follow through of coursework like assessment and continuity of material is lost in the shuffle.
She has never heard of any authorities in Ambler harassing the Hispanic population or problems with town or school officials. Mauri has attempted to contact the school district on many occasions to let the administration know about the program, but she hasn’t heard a word back from them. It is her suspicion that the district is afraid of being held liable in case of some unknown event.
Gerardo
Gerardo is a 60 year old from Peru who has been in the country for 10 years. In Peru he was a commercial fisherman. Upon arriving on a tourist visa with his family, they decided to stay. Gerardo said that although they were making a decent salary in Peru, he wanted his children to have the opportunity to learn English and learn at a US university. His son is now 20 and is studying on a scholarship to Bucknell University. His daughter is 26, has a BA and is working.
Gerardo believes that it is the role of the classroom teacher to get the most out of the students. He believes that many immigrant parents want their students challenged and they in turn support whole-heartedly the good intentions of the school system. He believes that the system did his children well and that there was never a problem matriculating in the school system nor any mal intent on behalf of any teacher.
Gerardo’s biggest challenge has been the ongoing ordeal caused by his lack of papers. When asked if he wants the US to be his final resting place he said yes, because he has made a home here, but would be just as content to live out his days in Peru. He hopes that is son will be able to support him.
Being from Peru has not been a disadvantage for finding work or finding local resources from the Hispanic community. He feels that the connection between Hispanic community members involves more the Spanish language than country of citizenship. He has not felt singled out by police or other governmental authorities nor by the school district. However, he states that most of the exploitation comes from within the community in the form of undercutting bids and not paying market price for labor.
Jaime
Jaime is a 20 year-old Mexican from Puebla. He has come to Ambler to live with his five brothers. They are involved with various labor jobs, Jaime works at the laundry mat. Upon first sight Jaime seems a little different than many immigrants. He is soft spoken, speaks without a heavy dialect of Spanish. The reason he says he is perceived a little different is because he studies computer technology and has a long history of playing computer games. In fact the reason he has come to the US is to study computer science with the possibility of going home to teach.
Unfortunately for Jaime upon arriving when he just turned 17 he got the wrong information from a Colombian friend of a friend about matriculation into school and missed his opportunity to receive formal classes. Not until this interview did he find out that he would have been eligible to attend the high school.
He believes that there is a lot of support within the community and believes that this is the strength of the community. In fact, he believes that if you were to come to this country without knowing anyone you would be able to find plenty of support within the culture. These days a friend of a friend of a friend is staying with them who just arrived from Mexico. On the flip side he believes that because of not having appropriate paperwork or understanding how things work in education he is frustrated with his progress thus far in the US.
Nick Coggins (son in law of Mauri McKey)
ESL teacher/ coordinator for BUSCA at LaSalle University
http://www.lasalle.edu/schools/sas/busca/
BUSCA is a program at LaSalle University dedicated to assist Latino ESL students have the opportunity to advance from ESL or bilingual into the undergraduate level. It is a five semester transitional associates degree program intended for Latino students with a high school diploma or a GED. The group is 100% ESL with intense Grammar and writing during the first year. As the students progress adjunct content area professors teach various content area courses to prepare the students for a channeled 3rd year of university undergraduate work.
The ESL courses are usually compartmentalized Grammar, composition, and university studies. The university studies component is designed specifically to teach students about the presentation of material and professional standards of investigation and academia. The second semester is the beginning of a general core curriculum which English still part.
The role of Spanish is critical in the curriculum. Even in the ESL classes there is a fair amount of communication in Spanish to clarify instructions as well to help clarify narration and brainstorming ideas. There are no ESL teachers who are also content area teachers. However, about half of the content teachers are bilingual in content area classes of Computer Science, Math, and Biology are taught in Spanish.
Teachers value the cultures of classroom especially in the beginning levels of the program students share many aspects of their lives’ similarities and differences through dialogue and narratives.
Students at the beginning of the program tend to have more formative assessments alongside oral testing, portfolios, and papers instead of major exams. Teachers at this level try to help students identify repeated errors.
.
The teachers in the BUSCA program are dynamic that understand good teaching principles, and have a great deal of empathy. Teachers essentially create IEP’s for each student so that he or she will find success. One-third of the applicants are weeded out through assessment, but the L2 range is level 2-4 for the majority of students.
The program recently began a summer course designed to build grammar skills in Spanish. The class is not for credit; however, it has become popular amongst students due to the measure of their writing success after taking the course.
Many students are very motivated. Of the 19 graduates from last year’s program all are currently enrolled in a LaSalle undergraduate major. Many also have to take care of some family member at home or are a parent. One of the challenges of the program is the large amount of women that get pregnant during the 5 semesters. At one point there seems always to be no less than 10 pregnant women enrolled. However, all tend to complete the coursework.
Future coursework is being added. It will be call a “Capstone course,” dedicated to getting BUSCA students more ready culturally for the academia. Capstone courses work particularly on presentations, professional skills, and academic culture. It will help students become advocates for themselves, fully participating in the college process.
He would also like to see this program extended into other universities. Temple Ambler would be a great place to run something similar, as well as Montgomery County Community College. He feels that LaSalle is not meeting the needs to Mexican immigrants and would like to make more contact.
Su
Su is a business owner of a small convenience store who is native Korean. He is 50 years old and moved to Guatemala when he was 28 to teach Tae Kwon Do. After having a street fight with some men who were harassing him with racial slurs at a local restaurant in Guatemala he moved to the US with his Guatemalan wife. Upon entering the US he made contact with Koreans seek appropriate funds, and was able to get on his feet. He has had the store now for 10 years. He has two children and is very happy with the way that they have been treated by the school district.
As a Korean he has a different perspective on his status within the Hispanic community. However, says that he is proud to be an integral part. In fact, his store is frequented by Hispanics, African-Americans, and Whites from the local area. He says that he does not feel prejudice and does not feel stereotyped or exploited in any way.
Su believes that anyone who comes to this country to work hard should be treated equally, but realizes that it should be just as important to learn English and get an education.
Reflections
Overall my perceptions of the community of immigrants in Ambler have deepened. Although I was, in my opinion, more informed about some of the goings-on than most, I have a sense more of the some of the intricate framework that makes up the support structure for Hispanics in Ambler. The perspectives of the people I interviewed were varied, but seemed to follow a similar vein. All felt comfortable in the community of Ambler, and in general in the US. However, there is the underlying concern of not having immigration documents. At no point did anyone ever use the phrase illegal, which so often is used by the media, only undocumented. Regardless of this status, most felt safe with the local authorities. However, there does not seem to be much understanding of the greater support that is available to them. For example, children are not signed up for local soccer leagues, and the church membership is not high although many in the community consider themselves Catholic.
One insight that was opened to me through Jaime was the fact that people sometimes enter the US without any understanding of the legal opportunities they have an in his case close. Jaime seems sharp, and I can’t help but imagine the education that he missed by being misinformed.
Speaking with the volunteers at St. Joseph’s opened me up to the good intentions of a sorely needed ESL program in the area. Nonetheless, I do not question their motives, but have some concerns about the hidden agenda of assimilation. In reality its probably just semantics on this level but given the Crawford articles discussed in class its not a bad idea to be critical of good intentions. Yet, from what I have witnessed in no transparent way in the classroom does the St. Joseph’s program not respect diversity.
I don’t diverge much from the literature or the discussions that we have had in class. In fact, I seem to find myself as a trumpet for much of the rhetoric. I have more understanding of the implications of exterior forces such as the dominant hidden curriculum and some very oppressive histories involved with the status involuntary minorities. However, I cannot come to any specific conclusions on why the Mexican immigrant or for that matter Hispanic immigrants that have come to this country voluntarily have not met the standards for this status that Ogbu, for example, has stressed.
In sum I believe that this project has positively affected the manner in which I might go about teaching in the future. From what I have learned there is definitely a need to go deeper into understanding the value of the culture from which a student comes. I found that by simply walking through the park and introducing myself as a teacher that is interested in the community, I have always been met with respect and courtesy. Even if I were not to interview by the guidelines of Hollins’s RIQ, by at least understanding more of the cultural history and identifying some key support systems of the community I will better be able to teach. Specifically, I have a better understanding of the cultural capital and can better utilize Moll’s Funds of knowledge.
1. Zhang, Yn-li,(Dec. 2007) Ctitique on the Four Levels of Cross-Cultural Awareness. Sino-US English Teaching (Vol. 4 No. 12)
2. Hollins, E (2008) Culture in School Learning (2nd edition) Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates
3. Ogbu, J.U. (2004) Understanding Cultural Diversity and Learning. In J.A. Banks and C.A. McGee Banks, Handbook of Research on Multicultural Education (ppp582-593). Sand Francisco: Jossey-Bass
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