13 Mar 2013

New Education grant helps Spanish speakers shine

First generation Latino students can find themselves at a disadvantage in school. Their parents, many who emigrated from Mexico, may not yet speak enough English or have the formal schooling to help their children with homework, as is often expected by teachers. Even their own language skills and background can be challenged on a daily basis. When students finish high school, the prospect of obtaining a college degree and pursuing a career can feel a bit like going to another world. If they choose the college path, they are headed somewhere no one in their families has been before.  And it can require an act of genuine imagination for both student and parents.

A new Puente educational programming grant from the Sand Hill Foundation turns students’ backgrounds into an asset to be cultivated, not a liability – especially their language abilities.  The Sand Hill support supplements earlier grants from Philanthropic Ventures Foundation and the Access to Achievement Foundation. Puente Academic Director Suzanne Abel is using the $35,000 grant – which was awarded in December – to help improve academic outcomes for Pescadero High School and Middle School students, most of whom are Latino.

Poetry 5

Abel recently spearheaded a partnership with Stanford University, which enrolled Pescadero youth in the Stanford College Prep summer program and a year-long interdisciplinary Introduction to Latin American Studies through the SAAGE (Stanford Academic Alliance for Global Enrichment) initiative of the Center for Latin American Studies.

Puente has already teamed with the La Honda-Pescadero Unified School District and nearby universities to put the grant to work in support of several initiatives, including planned programs designed to bolster biliteracy in creative ways; bring parents into their children’s academic lives; and break the isolation of living on the South Coast by exposing students to college campuses and programs focused on meeting the needs of first generation students.

For the first time, this May 3, graduating seniors at Pescadero High School will be awarded the State of California’s Seal of Biliteracy. Many students are already bilingual, serving as de facto translators and interpreters for their parents, yet they may not recognize the career potential of refining these remarkable skills. The state’s Seal of Biliteracy is the first in the nation, a model that now has been adopted by New York State.

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“They can put the recognition on their resumes. It’s something amazing to offer on the job market, and most of them take it for granted without fanfare,” says Abel.In the wider world, some students may feel they need to hide their Spanish and their ethnic backgrounds in order to succeed. In reality, these students represent the face of a more globalized America: the Latino population alone is projected to grow from 16% to 30% of the US population by 2050, presenting a systemic challenge to public education but also tremendous opportunity.

“It’s a strange aspect of our national myth that immigrants should leave their country of origin and first language behind in order to become ‘American’,” Abel says. “Arguably, that made some sense at the turn of the 20th Century, but in today’s connected world, the ability to navigate more than one language and culture is a tremendous advantage.” According to Abel, sadly, too often immigrants’ Spanish is perceived as a deficit or a problem.

Projects like these have been possible thanks to the enthusiastic participation of the La Honda-Pescadero Unified School District (LHPUSD), which has the challenge of bringing Spanish-speaking students up to par in English in order to excel. Pescadero High School Principal Pat Talbot says she couldn’t be happier.

“I think the Seal of Biliteracy is fabulous! It puts being bilingual in such a positive way, and one that will only enhance students’ opportunities for the future,” says Talbot. “Since this award is so new, it also puts us on the ‘cutting edge,’ so to speak.”

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This year, three teachers also started using the Poetry Inside Out (PIO) curriculum, a program of the Center for the Art of Translation in San Francisco. PIO gives students a poem written in a foreign language and walks them through a process of translating the poem first into English, literally line-by-line, and then another version with creative juices flowing. Students have to debate and defend their word choices, and engage with the complexities of both languages.

Puente introduced the program to the school district, hosting a 2-day training led by Dr. Marty Rutherford and her colleague, Mark Hauber, which was attended by LHPUSD staff and by bilingual specialists from the San José Unified School District. At their core, so many of the academic challenges in the school district derive from communication issues — that’s what Abel has concluded since coming to work for Puente.

For instance, because many local parents have only a few years of schooling and minimal exposure to English, they have difficulty understanding what happens in local schools (especially beyond the elementary grades) and therefore struggle to be strong advocates for their children.

Among other uses, Puente will apply Sand Hill Foundation grant funding to bilingual summer “math camp” workshops for Latino parents through the school district, and to expand Puente’s parenting class series to include more sessions focused on understanding the U.S. education system so that parents can better support their children.

Finally, on May 17, Puente will hold its second annual “First Generation Careers Night” for prospective college students and their parents. Bilingual speakers from a wide range of careers will share their own stories of immigration, education, and the path to meaningful work, as part of Puente’s evolving approach to opening the doors of possibility to more Pescadero students and their families.

13 Mar 2013

Jump, spin and grin: Zumbathon kicks off Puente’s 15-year anniversary

It’s been three years since Puente held its first Zumba class in the gym at Pescadero Elementary. Even in isolated Pescadero, the fitness class – which incorporates elements of salsa, merengue and other improvised Latin dances – was an instant hit. “People got hooked on the first day,” recalls Rita Mancera, Program Director at Puente and one of three Puente staff members who double as Zumba instructors. Today, twice-weekly classes are often so packed – with up to 50 adults and children jumping, spinning, and grinning – that there is barely room to move.

On February 26, Puente kicked off its 15-year anniversary celebrations by holding the first-ever local ‘Zumbathon’ – a Zumba marathon that doubles as a fundraiser to keep the Zumba classes going at their current level. The event raised $737, slightly short of its fundraising goal of $1,000.

Although Puente receives support from the Bella Vista Foundation for Zumba, Mancera explains that Puente needs to raise money to cover childcare and to replace the sound system that belongs to the La Honda-Pescadero School District. Zumba classes have low overhead and are donation-based. Puente does pay its instructors and covers ongoing training obtained through their membership to the Zumba instructor network.

Zumba lover Erika Vera, 33, has been coming to classes since they began in 2010. Vera loves to dance, and she says Zumba changed her life. She’s lost weight and, during dance sessions, enjoys the opportunity to focus on her body instead of the day-to-day problems that may await her at home.

“I feel healthier and I’m always full of energy,” says Vera, who definitely needs energy for her 3 children. “Before, I was fuller and I didn’t even have the motivation to go out and walk. But now I do.”

Erika Vera was honored as a Zumba All-Star

The South Coast, of course, has no fitness gym or dance club. Field and nursery workers have little time to exercise and often lack the time and resources to eat healthy food to avoid problems like obesity and diabetes.

Zumba became a worldwide craze after a Colombian dance instructor presented it to a fitness class in Miami 10 years ago. Today Zumba classes extend well into both hemispheres and will shortly be introduced to Russia, India and China. Zumba came to Pescadero at the initiative of Visión y Compromiso, a California-based nonprofit that advocates for community health. Visión y Compromiso brought instructors to Pescadero to teach the first few Zumba classes at Puente, after which Puente took over.

Zumba is joyful and it’s communal. It’s about sweating, shaking your hips, and laughing when you mess up a routine. It tends to attract a lot of mothers like Erika Vera, and children as well – some as young as 10.

 

Gaby Flores, 21, leads Zumba classes at Puente. She’s held a number of jobs at Puente over the years, but teaching Zumba is her favorite.

“I like it because for an hour, people can forget about everything and everyone else. I like that I can bring happiness to them, even if it’s in a small way,” she says. More than 171 adults, youth and children have attended twice-weekly Zumba classes since its most popular program began in 2010.  In 2013 alone, 83 participants have attended. In a special, targeted Rally campaign, Puente is trying to meet a $5,000 gap in fundraising for the program. To help, go to www.rally.org/puente.

 

To learn more about Zumba or to donate, please call Puente at (650) 879-1691. 

13 Mar 2013

Why we give to Puente: Rob Johnson and Lary Lawson

Lary Lawson and Rob Johnson

Rob and Lary at the Puente office

It’s wonderful when an organization succeeds – but there is a special kind of parental pride that comes from having been there from the beginning and witnessed its first steps in the world.

That is how Rob Johnson and Lary Lawson feel about Puente. The longtime Pescadero residents have been volunteers from the earliest days of the Puente Ministry, founded in the back of the Pescadero Community Church. Their generous continuing efforts and donations have helped Puente grow its programs. Today, Johnson chairs Puente’s 13-member Board of Directors. Lawson is the South Coast CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) coordinator, helping Puente and the wider community prepare for emergencies.

As Puente celebrates its 15-year anniversary this spring, both men reflect on how they contributed to Puente’s origins – and how it’s been to watch the ‘little nonprofit that could’ become the go-to resource for the entire South Coast community.

“I realized that I was afraid to talk to anybody in town”

Johnson and Lawson, who are a couple, moved to Pescadero in 1988. Johnson describes the South Coast back then as a place even more insular than it is today, cut off from the outside world and stratified between the English-speaking Anglos and the Spanish-speaking Latino field workers.

“I realized that I was afraid to talk to anybody in town,” recalls Johnson. That changed when Rev. Wendy Taylor founded Puente and started offering Spanish classes — really conversation classes that gave Johnson a chance to learn about the background and culture of the fieldworkers in town.

That spirit of connection grows each year with community events that bring locals together, like Puente’s seasonal Pescadero Grown! Farmers’ Markets and the Christmas Posada. Puente’s twice-weekly Zumba classes bring women, children, and sometimes a few men of different backgrounds together to exercise. And Puente’s new upstart ESL curriculum (designed by Professor Guadalupe Valdés of Stanford University) is already paving the way for a new generation of Latinos to learn English — just in time to more fully benefit from forthcoming federal immigration reforms as well as, of course, so much more.

Rob, Rita (Puente's Program Director), and Lary

Rob, Rita (Puente’s Program Director), and Lary

And the learning continues. Johnson has watched the first generation of Puente youth go from teenaged interns to college students.

Johnson joined the Puente Board of Directors as Treasurer four years ago. He says he feels a “good energy” now. He sees it as a direct result of Puente’s spirited staff and dedicated cadre of volunteers.

“I think the town is much more integrated, much less segregated now. I think people are learning from each other.”

From bicycles to tax returns

Long before Puente came along, Lary Lawson used his connections at the Pescadero Thrift Store, run by South Coast Children’s Services, to bring t-shirts and other secondhand clothing to the migrant farm workers scattered around the area. After Rev. Taylor founded Puente, Lawson took on a ‘truck driver’ role – giving single men a lift to the homes of family members, especially at holiday time. Lawson would also pick up donated bicycles and convey them to their recipients in the bike donation program.

Those were the hand-to-mouth years, when Puente was there with a hot meal for field workers. Today, the organization still offers that along with a great deal more.

“They’ve grown from nowhere, to the church back room, to a small space in town, to the elementary school,” says Lawson, describing how Puente’s office space has shifted to accommodate its growth.

One perfect symbol of how much life has changed on the South Coast is that many of the people who never used to have the wherewithal to get around on their own are now filing annual tax returns with Puente’s free tax service. Both Lawson and Johnson are income tax volunteers with Puente, a job they both enjoy this time of year.

“I used to drive them around. Now they’re coming to us to do income taxes. That’s a huge leap,” marvels Lawson.

Rob filing taxes

Rob filing taxes

 

To donate to Puente, visit https://rally.org/puente. To learn more about volunteering with Puente, contact Abby Mohaupt at amohaupt@mypuente.org or (650) 879-1691 x196.