As anyone who’s traveled to a foreign country can attest, food can vary greatly from land to land.
So it shouldn’t come as any surprise that when some immigrants move to America, their health declines because they don’t have access to the fresh produce that enriched their diets in their native country.
In rural western Colorado, a unique program is solving this problem by helping immigrants learn English while they grow healthy food for their families — and it’s giving the farmer who hosts them some new notions about what crops to grow, too.
In the town of Delta, immigrants from countries including Mexico and Myanmar who sign up for ESL classes learn about a program at the Thistle Whistle Farm, located near Hotchkiss, Colo., about 45 minutes away. The immigrants help out at the farm and in doing so, get tips on how to cultivate and grow their own food. Plus, they can practice their English writing skills while taking notes on gardening techniques.
Their ESL and farming teacher, Chrys Bailey, tells Laura Palmisano of KVNF, “A lot of what has brought them to the program is that they are noticing that their families and themselves are beginning to suffer from health issues that they had not suffered from before and they are making the connection that some of their food choices are not serving them.”
Some students bring their children to Thistle Whistle to help out, filling idle summer hours with a productive and fun activity. “My kids enjoy coming to the farm and they like it because they learn about plants and how to grow some vegetables,” Yadira Rivera tells Palmisano.
The participants then take their new found gardening skills back home, planting their own vegetables, even if the only space they have is a couple of pots.
The program, which has run for three years through a grant from the Colorado Health Foundation, needs funding to continue.
Meanwhile, Mark Waltermire, the owner of Thistle Whistle Farm, has benefitted from the program too. “They’ve suggested or requested I grow a lot of vegetables and herbs I haven’t heard or tried before and I’ve been introduced to all sorts of fun, new varieties and fun new vegetables that I would otherwise not have been exposed to. So it has changed my diet too. I eat all sorts of things that I previously never knew about.”
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Tag: english as a second language
This Online School Could Transform the Way Latin Americans Learn English
Going to school doesn’t have to entail boring lectures and multiple choice tests. In fact, using humor can be a great way for people to learn.
In the 30 second clip below, a man follows a beautiful woman on the beach. He, with his dark eyes and chiseled features, stares at the woman and tells her seductively, “Persueychon.” No response. He repeats “Persueychon” again and again. Finally, she asks him, “Did you mean, ‘Persuasion?'”
The ad is one of the many humorous videos from Open English, a 24/7 online platform that teaches Latin speakers how to speak English fluently. The online school, which has its headquarters in Miami, launched in 2008 and has already amassed 100,000 students worldwide — including 5,000 in America. While there is already a sea of computer-based language classes such as Rosetta Stone and Babbel, Open English just focuses on one language: English. It’s also more affordable than other programs. For about $80 a month, Open English students listen in on live lectures in small classrooms with native English speakers around the clock.
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“We wanted to create something that was monthly and cheap and allowed you to get started,” Open English CEO Andres Moreno said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal. “That has been the niche Open English has filled.”
The school has certainly cornered the market — especially since it’s been pegged as something that could help Latin Americans step up the career ladder. The Journal reports that Open English is now valued at $350 million after recently raising $120 million in venture capital. Investors apparently saw the potential of an increasingly tech-savvy Latin American middle class.
According to Education News, half of Latin Americans (around 300 million people) use the Internet. And in the past year, there has been a 17 percent increase of Internet-use within that population.
“The demographics are there,” Cate Ambrose, president of the Latin American Private Equity & Venture Capital Association told the WSJ. “You have a growing middle class and a young demographic with a climbing increase in the consumption of technology.”
If this creates more Latin American success stories, we are all for it.
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A High School That’s Open Late — But Not for the Kids
These days, Hackensack High School in New Jersey stays open long after the kids have gone home. The classrooms are filled by students’ parents, seeking their own education.
“To take ESL classes in the U.S. is very expensive, so when I heard they are giving English class in the high school, I said I want to go,” says Albina Cruz, who came to the U.S. as a teenager, but didn’t feel pressure to learn English until she had children of her own. “I know that it’s very hard when [they] do homework and don’t have anyone to check if it’s right or wrong,” Cruz says.
The mother of two is one of 350 parents who have participated in the new program — launched in 2012 by the Hackensack school district where 60 percent of students are Hispanic — designed to help immigrant parents become more involved in their children’s education. Diana Bermudez, parent outreach facilitator for the school district, spearheaded the program and says parent attendance at school meetings has more than quadrupled since the program began.
A recent study published in the New York Times confirms there is no clear consensus on whether parental involvement does improve a child’s academic performance, but Bermudez says thats not just about academics, its also about building a stronger community. “We try to work as a team where everyone can give back, everyone can do a little something to help us all move on and that’s the culture we’re creating.”