I had my coffee and my "morning brew." Tina Griego from the Denver Post stopped by the radio show yesterday. This is the column she wrote today:

morning brew | tina griego

Griego: Radio program opens a window for immigrant parents

By Tina Griego
Denver Post Columnist

Posted: 09/02/2010 01:00:00 AM MDT

On Wednesday morning, Alex Sanchez, host and creator of Denver Public Schools' EDUCA radio talk show, took a call from a woman in Denver named Leticia.

Before I get to her question, some background on EDUCA, which is one of the district's more brilliant ideas. It's a program aimed at Spanish-speaking parents of school-age children. It airs three times a week on MARIA 1090 AM.

The program centers on one theme: parental involvement in their kids' education. The how and why and what of it is delivered in lively Spanish that is part exhortation and part explanation. Sanchez signs off with: "El futuro de sus hijos está en sus manos, que no se le olvide." Your children's future is in your hands; don't forget.

Sanchez, 29, is the son of Mexican immigrants. He was born in Los Angeles. His mother was deported when he was young and so they lived in Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, until he was 10. His father gained legal residency through the Reagan-era amnesty program. Sanchez graduated from high school in Basalt. His mother, a longtime legal resident, will take her citizenship exam later this month.

I mention all this because it informs Sanchez's job as the director of the district's Multicultural Outreach Office. It informs the debut of the talk show a year ago, and the newspaper-like newsletters printed in Spanish, Vietnamese, Arabic and, coming soon, French and Nepalese. And it informs the district's latest ambition, the next step in the integration of immigrant parents into our community: English lessons. Free. Broadcast over the radio, three lessons a week for 35 weeks, with accompanying lesson books. The district wants to recruit 5,000 parents by the Sept. 15 launch.

Leticia wants in.

That immigrants here should learn to speak English is a no-brainer. It's necessary for both the immigrant and the larger community. English is the language of our society, our economy, our government. The inability to speak English isolates people. It leaves vast potential untapped.

The need to speak English should not be equated to the replacement of one tongue by another. It means English must be added to the repertoire.

This is easier said than done. Immigrants, no matter their country of origin, tend to live in enclaves. Their contact with the outside world is often limited to church, job and their children's school. In the first two places, the mother tongue dominates interaction. That leaves school.

DPS has 78,000 students. Those students speak more than 124 languages at home. Forty percent speak Spanish at home. Many kids function as translators, their parents' bridges to the larger world. It's not a position that's healthy for child or parent.

The rap on immigrants — and generally the target is Spanish speakers — is that they don't want to learn to speak English. This is a political canard that makes it easier to switch the discussion from one of accessibility to one of values, from inclusion in our society to rejection of it.

Sanchez will tell you he's never met an immigrant who doesn't want to learn English, who does not understand its benefits. That's been my experience, as well.

The program, called Maestro en Casa, comes out of the San Antonio- based nonprofit Mexicans and Americans Thinking Together. Its impetus was immigration reform, says MATT Foundation executive director Aracely Garcia-Granados, who is from Guatemala. Polls demonstrated the public demand that immigrants learn to speak English as a requirement of legal residency.

"So the original idea was to prepare ourselves for immigration reform," she says. But then the group found that 60 percent of immigrants who are here legally and are eligible to become citizens have not done so because they cannot speak English. "That means they are not active participants in society," she says.

Radio is hugely popular among Spanish-speaking immigrants, so the marriage of it with English instruction holds promise. Students don't have to worry about transportation, about cost, about being embarrassed. The lessons will follow an immigrant family "as they open a bank account, call a doctor, go to school. It's all situational," Sanchez says. "The key word here is integration."

And, no, half-hour lessons three times a week will not catapult someone into fluency, but they can build the confidence needed to go out and learn more. The program will end with an exam and a reception. Call 720-423-2555 for more information.

Denver is the first school district in the country to partner with the MATT Foundation, and the only cost to DPS is staff time. As for Leticia, she is 47 and from Mexico. She has no formal education and has lived here for 30 years. She has two elementary school children.

Why do you want to learn English? Sanchez asks Leticia. She says, sounding both ashamed and frustrated, that she cannot understand her daughters' homework.

Leticia signs up. One thousand parents registered and counting.

Tina Griego writes Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Reach her at 303-954-2699 or tgriego@denverpost.com.

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