Workplace Spanish fills growing need in the community
By Kay Rooff-Steffen, MA
Kay Rooff-Steffen
Department Coordinator and Instructor, Humanities
Unity Hospital, HNI Oak Steel, Muscatine County banks and credit unions, Heinz, All Steel, West Liberty Foods, Bandag, Muscatine School Administration, Monsanto and Muscatine Community College. What do all of these local institutions have in common? All have pro-actively encouraged their staff members to learn basic conversational Spanish through MCC’s “Workplace Spanish.”
Breaking journalistic rules, I shall explain this vital communication tool in the first person, since I created the first customized Spanish class called “Survival Spanish for Hospital Employees” at what was then Muscatine General Hospital. I have since enhanced this energetic, interactive program; incorporating simple, useful phrase books with supplemental handouts that students help create during their classes.
This Continuing Education course usually runs four to six weeks, once or twice per week,late afternoons or early evenings, for two hours each time. Businesses or organizations choose the class location and number of sections to suit them. For example, Sivyer Steel in Bettendorf and Oak Steel both had enough interest to fill two back-to-back sections at their respective sites. Participants were usually able to attend one or the other, regardless of last-minute meetings or work emergencies. The Spanish for Bankers class welcomed bank and credit union employees from Muscatine, Wilton and West Liberty and was held at MCC.
What sets this course apart from traditional beginning Spanish classes is the practical content and focus on speaking from the first hour of class. Students in my classes begin speaking immediately, build vocabulary (and confidence) as they progress. Does this mean they become fluent by the end of the program? Heavens no, but they are familiar enough with the language to have the courage to try to communicate in a language most familiar with a growing number of their customers, clients or patients. (Ask yourself if it matters to you whether a non-native English speaker has an accent when it comes to communicating a message and you might realize that trilling an ‘r’ makes absolutely no difference when it comes to getting your point across.)
Experience has shown me that, although some people learn languages easier than others, everyone can learn better if they are motivated. Professional productivity, improved service and enhanced customer satisfaction are all such motivators, (as is any incentive offered by one’s employer!). I tell participants that they should not worry about competing with each other. Their goal should be to “learn something more than they knew when they walked into class that night.” It is well known that oral language skills are the most challenging to adult learners; however, when we have a reason to use a language, we can learn it.
The course as well as the materials are divided into specific professional/departmental areas, such as human resources, maintenance, etc., and students are then able to gear their early learning toward which phrases they could use most.
One of my students, a hospital admissions assistant, homed in on phrases and terms she needed daily to best get information from Spanish-speaking patients and their family members. She even created a “cheat sheet” with phonetically written translations that she kept in her desk drawer. (The course books all include phonetic pronunciations.) She told me that she referred to it as she worked toward her fluency of those key phrases.
Loan officers and tellers at Wells Fargo in Davenport did the same thing, as well as occasionally practicing during their breaks with flash cards they made. Halfway through their class one of them told me, “Even if I sound like I’m butchering the language, a few of my customers have told me they not only understand me but they appreciate my willingness to speak to them in their native tongue.” She added, “They also seem to ask for me whenever they come in and have started to help me learn more.”
Class participants never worry about grades, grammar, homework or tests, although many practice with the CD that comes with the book while they are commuting to and from work. If students miss one class, no problem. I give them tentative timelines of what I plan to cover, minus student-developed phrase handouts, and they just return as soon as they can to get assistance, new instruction and actual oral practice.
Some companies motivate their staff members to attend classes by agreeing to pay for the course and materials in full as long as members attend a certain percentage of the classes. Occasionally there is an even bigger incentive.
A few years ago Monsanto participants were required to complete the course with 80% or more attendance, as well as a “demonstrated proficiency.” Why? Because most of those employees were headed to the company’s operation in Argentina shortly after we concluded.
One man from that class e-mailed me upon his return, thanking me for helping him, not only learn Spanish, but also learn some key phrases in a specific dialect spoken in that region. “I learned even more while I was [in Argentina],” he wrote, “but I would never have tried to communicate on my own had I not taken your class.”
With feedback like that, me da orgullo ser profesora de español. (I am proud to be a Spanish professor.)