{"id":211624,"date":"2023-10-16T15:32:30","date_gmt":"2023-10-16T19:32:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/chss\/?p=211624"},"modified":"2023-10-16T15:45:57","modified_gmt":"2023-10-16T19:45:57","slug":"se-habla-espanol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/chss\/2023\/10\/16\/se-habla-espanol\/","title":{"rendered":"Se Habla Espa\u00f1ol"},"content":{"rendered":"

Increasingly at Montclair State University, se habla espa\u00f1ol<\/em>. From working with media partners and training future digital storytellers to teaching Spanish to future law enforcement, health care and teaching professionals, Montclair\u2019s students are learning Spanish specific to their chosen fields.<\/p>\n

Senior Jurisprudence, Law and Society major Nayelis Fernandez credits the Spanish for Law Enforcement class with helping her during her summer internship with a law firm. \u201cIt gave me a lot of confidence,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I started school, I really wasn\u2019t speaking Spanish outside of my home, so I thought the class would challenge me, especially since I want to become an immigration attorney,\u201d says Fernandez, who has since been hired as a legal assistant at the firm where she interned. \u201cEven though the class was specifically for law enforcement, more on the criminal side, I really learned a lot. It challenged me, and it helped me with writing and speaking better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fernandez says the class, taught by adjunct professor Mayra Badillo, not only helped her learn legal terms in Spanish but also maintain a certain level of professionalism. \u201cProfessor Badillo challenged us to speak as though we were working for a police department, so we would have to practice giving speeches to the community,\u201d she says, adding that she expects the class to continue to assist her as she moves toward her goal of becoming an immigration lawyer.\u00a0 \u201cI want to be the voice for and help those people because they have no idea what the law is, and with immigration law, it\u2019s constantly changing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\""Antonella
Antonella Calarota-Ninman, Spanish language coordinator for the Spanish and Latino Studies department, says career-specific courses help students in their chosen professions.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Spanish for Law Enforcement is the most recent career-focused class added to the Spanish department\u2019s roster, says Antonella Calarota-Ninman, Spanish language coordinator for the Spanish and Latino Studies department. There is also Spanish for Health Practitioners. Other classes, such as Spanish for Heritage Speakers, Spanish for Teachers and Spanish and International Business have been offered for some time; the latter by the Feliciano School of Business for many years.<\/p>\n

While the department offers a robust roster of Spanish courses, including Negotiation Skills in Spanish, certificates in translation and interpreting and many classes for heritage speakers, Calarota-Ninman says she routinely tells students about the career-specific classes. \u201cImagine how useful it would be for you to satisfy a language requirement with a class that prepares you for your profession,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

The Spanish for Law Enforcement class consists primarily of Justice Studies majors, says Badillo, a former lawyer in France and the Dominican Republic, who created the curriculum. She says her classes, numbering 30, consist of students interested in becoming police officers, lawyers and social workers. She presents them with real-life scenarios where they role-play and give people instructions in Spanish.<\/p>\n

Badillo, who is married to a retired police officer, says speaking or understanding Spanish can mean the difference between life and death. \u201cIt\u2019s important to speak Spanish when you are in the field of law enforcement.\u201d<\/p>\n

\""A
Adjunct Professor Abigail Fana \u201922 MA, teaches students in her Spanish I class.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Adjunct professor Abigail Fana has Montclair Spanish courses to thank for her career at the University. Fana graduated with a BA in English, minors in Linguistics and Spanish and a certificate in Translation in 2020 and a master\u2019s in Spanish and a certificate in Interpreting in 2022. While a teaching assistant working on her master\u2019s, Fana started workshops where she led around 300 students per week in Spanish oral communication. Those workshops continue biweekly to this day with both professors and teaching assistants splitting duties.<\/p>\n

When a Spanish professor left the University, Fana was asked to teach and has now taught Spanish I for three semesters. She\u2019s also currently teaching Translation I while a professor is on sabbatical. While other opportunities have arisen, she is happy teaching Spanish I. \u201cI feel like I can make a bigger difference teaching Spanish I and encouraging students, emphasizing how important it is, teaching them culture and things like that,\u201d Fana says.<\/p>\n

Fana also co-led the Spanish interpretation for Montclair\u2019s first Spanish simulcast of Commencement this year with her friend Richard Solis \u201923 MA, whose master\u2019s is also in Spanish.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were good, positive reviews,\u201d she says, noting that the three ceremonies racked up almost 6,000 views despite not being advertised. \u201cThis is really great because it was the first time that they had ever done this, and it really helped people because there are so many Hispanics,\u201d she says. Fana is hoping for even more listeners during the 2024 Commencement, for which she will be interpreting.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, she and Solis are currently working on another first \u2013 translating the University\u2019s website, beginning with the FAQ pages \u2013 \u201calso a pretty big, important step,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

In addition to the many course offerings by the Spanish and Latino Studies department, Montclair also has a Spanish journalism class, Reportando las Noticias. The class is unusual in that it is available to all majors.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s open to the campus community, so anybody can take the class,\u201d says Thomas Franklin, an associate professor in the School of Communication and Media. \u201cNo matter what your major is, what your area of interest is, and no matter what your language proficiency is, we welcome everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

The class, which started in 2019 after two students pitched the idea, is offered in the spring semester. \u201cThe idea is that most people speak or understand some Spanish, and the competency in Spanish varies quite a bit,\u201d says Franklin, who co-leads the class with a Spanish-language media professional. While much of the class is in English, \u201cthere was a good amount of Spanish spoken and instruction in both languages.\u201d<\/p>\n

Translation News Service<\/strong><\/p>\n

Also employing both English and Spanish is the NJ News Commons Spanish Translation News Service<\/a>, a project of Montclair\u2019s Center for Cooperative Media made possible through a $75,000 grant from New Jersey Civic Information Consortium (NJCIC). Now in its second year, the service provides translation of English-language news articles into Spanish for publication in Spanish-language publications.<\/p>\n

The service was piloted with funding from the Democracy Fund and the NJCIC in 2020 prior to the presidential election with election-related content translated in Spanish to help increase \u201cvoter participation in the Latino community,\u201d says Anthony Advincula, the ethnic and community media coordinator at the Center for Cooperative Media. It started with seven English- and Spanish-language media partners.<\/p>\n

What the participating news organizations discovered, he says, is that there was value in translating other stories as well. \u201cThe Spanish-language news outlets don\u2019t have the same resources that the mainstream media have to cover these stories,\u201d Advincula says, \u201cSo, it became all types of stories \u2013 from breaking news to investigative news, rather than just election-related content.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today, the translation service boasts 12 English- and Spanish-language media partners. They include: NorthJersey.com, NJ Advance Media\/NJ.com, Asbury Park Press<\/em>, Press of Atlantic City,<\/em> NJ Spotlight News\/NJ PBS, Front Runner New Jersey, The Latino Spirit, New Jersey Hispano<\/em>, Americano Newspaper, CATA Radio and Reporte Hispano.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe main goal of this is really to narrow that information gap because we realize that there\u2019s still language barriers in the Latino communities and a lack of nuanced and informed reporting from their language and perspective,\u201d Advincula says.<\/p>\n

New Jersey Hispano<\/em> Editor Maricarmen Amado says the service has been helpful to her digital and print newspaper. \u201cThe stories have been prepared for larger newspapers with larger teams, resulting in stories with more depth,\u201d she says, adding that the feedback from Spanish readers has been positive.<\/p>\n

Given her journalistic background, Amado translates the stories. \u201cIt\u2019s easy for me to understand and translate,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s not just translated but written in the way that Hispanics speak.\u201d<\/p>\n

The largest beneficiary of the translation services \u201cis our community,\u201d Amado says.<\/p>\n

Story by Staff Writer Sylvia A. Martinez<\/a><\/strong>. Photos by University Photographer Mike Peters<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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