Alex Sanchez has done radio outreach before. Photos by Austin ISD; Nathan Bernier/KUT News; and Chrissy Polcino at flickr.com/pudstah/
April 17, 2012 5:36 am by: Nathan Bernier
Two-thirds of Austin ISD students are Hispanic, and more than half of those kids speak Spanish at home. Sometimes their parents are reluctant to get involved with the campus or the district, according to Alex Sanchez, AISD’s director of public relations and multicultural outreach.
Sanchez faced a similar challenge when working for Denver public schools and realized how he could reach those parents at home.
“As a community in Denver, we recognized that Spanish-dominant adults listen to radio, on average, seven to nine hours a day,” Sanchez said. “So commercial Spanish radio meant an opportunity for the school district to begin doing some very intentional and strategic work.”
Sanchez started a daily hourlong call-in radio show on one of Denver’s Spanish-language stations. And now he wants to do the same thing here.
The district hopes to get money from corporate underwriters or foundations to help pay for it. But AISD would still have to shell out about $60,000 a year for the program.
Sanchez says they would gauge the success of the show using the same metrics they did in Denver.
The radio show would be one of several AISD programs that aim to engage Spanish-speaking parents. This year the district started a program to teach English to 1,000 parents in their homes.
