Tag Archives: women

Tutoring English Means Being a Friend Too–HPL

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This semester, I volunteered at English language classes at the Hartford Public Library and assisted the English teacher in her course for beginners. I was able to interact with a lot of really interesting people who comprised the class, and were also recent immigrants in the United States. Most of the students were from Latin America, and spoke Spanish as a first language. The classes were really well structured and focussed on holistic education, so that students could practice reading, writing and speaking while they were there. More importantly, I got a chance to meet a large number of really interesting individuals with whom I had some long conversations with. This post will describe some of those conversations.

One of the first conversations I had was with Hugo, from Colombia, and Maria, from the Dominican Republic. Hugo arrived in Hartford around a year ago, and lives in an apartment on Main Street. His company, which processes coffee, sent him from Colombia to help with the marketing of their product in the region. They chose Hartford because of its large Hispanic population, which consumes that particular brand of coffee, and the city’s proximity to both Boston and New York for additional expansion. He seems to be very well off, and said that he currently holds a senior executive position at his company in Colombia. He says that he likes it here, and is looking forward for the next four years that he is supposed to live in the United States. He does mention, though, that had he been in a city with English as the dominant language, he would have found it easier to learn English.

Maria is a citizen of the United States, and had come here from the Dominican Republic around 12 years ago. Her level of English is really advanced, in comparison to the others in the class, but not good enough for the intermediate level class, that is also held in the library. She was mentioning about her recent visit to the dentist, and we began talking about health insurance. She said that she was lucky that she was covered under the insurance; otherwise, her bill would have been extremely high. She said that she was eligible for low cost insurance under Obamacare. She lives in Windsor, and drives to Hartford for the classes. She seems to be very culturally assimilated into the United States, probably because of the long time she has spent in this country.

Midonso is from Togo and is the only student in class who does not speak or understand Spanish. She speaks French, and her native language, Mina. As I am the only other person in class who speaks at least some French, I have had to explain many new words to her. Her learning rate is phenomenal, she can now communicate pretty well in English, albeit the difficulties she has with reading. What is surprising is that she is more than seventy years old, and still manages to attend every single class without fail. She lives in Hartford with her extended family. Her son is a part of the intermediate English class, and she comes to the library with him. Her whole family visits Togo every year to meet with old family friends and relatives. She says that being comparatively wealthy, her family is socially pressured to buy expensive presents for their relatives back home in Togo, and as a result going back is very expensive each year. But in spite of that, she says that she goes back because she misses life in Togo; the cold winter provides an additional incentive to go back as well.

The most important thing that I learnt from these interactions was that showing an interest in the lives of immigrants puts them at ease and helps them feel comfortable in the new environment of their host society. The amount of information that I got to learn from them made me realise the huge diversity that was present in the English classroom, and allowed me to identify with what immigrants think and made me realise the importance of the immigration process.  Chinmay R.

Tutoring at Jubilee House 2017

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In 1996, the late Sister Maris Stella Hickey bought a former convent house adjacent to the St. Augustine School in Hartford. The building was restored and opened to the public in 1997 as a community adult education and social service center. When I arrived at the Jubilee House, I was greeted by Sister Anne. She introduced me to the other tutors who were mostly older white women and former teachers. All of these women were paired with an adult student hoping to learn English. It seemed as though the majority of the adult students were women. For a while, I was idly waiting to be assigned a student.

Eventually, Sister Anne placed me with a Hispanic woman named C. C’s tutor was not present, so I was filling in. The first thing that C. asked me was if I spoke Spanish. I replied that I could speak some Spanish. Sister Anne gave me materials such as a teacher’s workbook and vocabulary flashcards. At first, I flipped through the vocabulary cards and asked C. to identify what each picture was. If she did not know a word, she would record it in her notebook. In addition, I also asked her to use the word correctly in a sentence. While I was tutoring C., I noticed that the demeanor of the other teachers with their students was much stricter than mine. C. and I joked around about the Super Bowl game and laughed about some of the obscurities of the English language. Everyone else in the room seemed intensely focused on their lesson. At 10:30, teachers and students took a fifteen-minute coffee break. I was unsure of where to sit, so I sat with C, and several of her other friends who all spoke Spanish. For the most part, C. and her friends spoke Spanish with one another and discussed their families. However, at many points they asked me questions in English such as where I attended school and where I was from.  It seemed that most of the other teachers were sitting together at a separate table.

After our refreshments, C. and I resumed our lesson. This time we discussed topics in her workbook and completed several preposition exercises. C. was better with vocabulary, but seemed to struggle more with grammar. Overall, however, C, was very eager to learn and we had a very productive session. Since it was my first time tutoring, C. showed me around the convent and instructed me on what is normally done during these sessions. Although I will probably be placed with another student in the next session, I appreciated C’s adaptability, kindness, and sense of humor.  Julia T.

Dedicated to Clients

This semester I worked with the International Hartford team in gathering information about immigrant entrepreneurs in Hartford, Connecticut.  Through participating in this research I had the opportunity to interview three immigrant business owners on New Britain Avenue in Hartford.  The main objective of conducting these interviews was to gain a general understanding of the amount of energy immigrant entrepreneurs bring to the Hartford area, in particular to the business district.  These businesses included a grocer, nail salon, and African hair-braiding salon.  After interviewing the immigrant owners of these businesses, I distinguished prevalent themes present in their process of starting a business as well as the many adversities they had to overcome.

My first and most informative interview was with a female owner of the African hair-braiding salon on New Britain Avenue in Hartford. The owner migrated to the United States from West Africa to seek enhanced economic opportunities.  Although she did not relocate to the United States with her immediate family, she explained that some of her extended family lives in the greater Hartford area.  The interview began with something of her background and her previous working experience before starting a business of her own.   As she shared this information I learned about the many challenges she faced in her process of starting a business and how she learned from those difficult experiences.

A dominant theme I detected in the contents of the interview was her lack of knowledge about the different prerequisites for starting a business, which created many hardships for her as a result.  When this business owner arrived in the United States, she was only fluent in French and spoke no English at all, hindering her ability to understand basic regulations and communicate effectively like city licensing requirements.  So she began taking courses at Capitol Community College, in Hartford, to learn English and received her hair styling license after attending classes at West Hartford Adult High School.  During this time, she was working as an employee for a salon on Albany Avenue in Hartford.  When that business eventually failed and shut down, she struggled to attract clients to her home-based business. She felt taken advantage of by her employers because they knew she lacked resources and had nowhere else to go.  After hair-braiding in her home temporarily to support herself financially, she saved enough money to lease a space and opened her storefront business. Her clients are like family and keep her motivated to continue what she does everyday with enthusiasm.

Along with the struggles she faced in starting a business of her own, she shared the future aspirations she has for her salon.  This owner wishes to expand her business and offer new services beyond just hair-braiding. As of now, she works on her own. However she plans to hire full-time employees to help grow her business once she earns enough money.  Currently, she is working closely with the University of Hartford on developing a business plan, which she expects to finalize soon.  In addition, she is a member of The Chamber, an organization based in Middletown, Connecticut that works to support small businesses.  When I asked her why she decided to open this type of business she was quick to explain that it was the only thing she knew, but emphasized that an individual should be truly passionate for their business and what they do.  The eagerness she expressed during the interview demonstrates the amount of energy immigrant business owners contribute to the Hartford business district. She is is driven by the love she has for both her clients and career.

Reflections on a Hair Salon up North Main Street

North Main Street is filled with shops owned by and catering to West Indian immigrants and somehow even a Korean businessman has found his niche along the strip.  Although he only has a fundamental level of English comprehension he is able to sell hair products to the women of the West Indian community. Communication is not an issue when the products provided are considered for quality and customer demand. The store manager says, “I just try to carry out more things that cater to what they want.  I try out the products myself, some of them and just see how it goes.”

Although it may be helpful for an entrepreneur to be a part of the community he is selling to it is not necessary. Social scientist, Zulema Valdez points out in her research entitled Beyond the Ethnic Enclave that “an increase in ethnic density will increase ethnic supply and demand in the market economy.” This says that the more concentrated a culture is in a community the more similar demands from the economy are expected from businesses. Hence one of the main necessities for a successful business is that an entrepreneur must do research on the demographics of a community and gage the level of demand for certain products in that area. The Korean owner of the beauty supply store on Main Street has done this; it targets people that make up a significant amount of the Hartford population and the desires of those possible customers.  According to the 2008-2012 American Community Survey[facfinder2.census.gov], about 10.7% of the Hartford residents claim West Indian ancestry, the biggest number of them claiming Jamaican ancestry. This useful information is the central means of the Korean owner’s beauty supply store on North Main Street.

Due to the high concentrations of ethnic groups in Hartford neighborhoods, such as the Jamaican, Italian, and Irish communities, an entrepreneur that wishes to start a business in particular areas must be well aware of the cultural demands of these communities.  This can be challenging for an entrepreneur if he is of a different ethnic group than their customers.  But for the Korean business owner on North Main Street it has come with ease by simply doing research on the demands of his community. For an entrepreneur to get the most business in a given area they must look at the cultural demands of that community and supply products that optimally meet the demands. It is then that the entrepreneur may have a significant rise in profits.