Spanish in Ohio

Melissa Logue: The objectives of the course are to allow the students to practice their language skills by working within the Hispanic community; understanding who the members of the Hispanic community are; and through volunteer and outreach trying to fill some of the gaps that we maybe recognize that are in the community.

We have an excursion every Friday. This next Friday we will be going to a place called Cuco's, which has a small restaurant and a very small market. But it will still give the students the opportunity to see how things are labeled, how things are presented, and look at the different kinds of products that are of interest to somebody in the Hispanic community that we might not know about even.

When we go to Cuco's, we've invited Erika Shell Castro to come and speak to the students. There's a huge need for interpreters in the medical community and that's one of the things that she does. She also serves on the health committee with LEON, LEON being the Latino Empowerment Outreach Network. It's a huge organization within the Hispanic community and she does a lot of other work within the community.

(Erika Shell Castro speaking Spanish to the class)

Melissa Logue: They have a hundred hours to log outside of the classroom. So, they can log their hours through immersion type activities, they can watch ten hours of TV, they can listen to ten hours of the radio and to music, but they're finding it much more rewarding for themselves and for others to actually go out and touch the community. And, I think Ohio State is one of the frontrunners in understanding that service learning is really important because we're not telling the community what their needs are; they're telling us what their needs are. So by allowing our students to fulfill those needs through a service learning experience, they are actually learning by having this experience and at the same time we're touching people's lives and that comes back to us.