Letter: Our bilingual students strengthen our community
As a parent and community member, I find it incredibly uplifting to know that right here in Dubois County, we have a school corporation that made the intentional decision to invest in dual language education.
To me, that says something important about our school leadership: the willingness to look at how our community is changing, learn, gather information, listen, plan for the future, and recognize the strengths that already exist within the people who live here to create this program.
When we recognize the languages, cultures, and experiences already present in our community as assets, we can create new opportunities not only for individual students, but for our entire region.
Bilingualism is a global skill and a competitive advantage. Our children are learning to communicate, learn, work, and build relationships across languages and cultures, these skills will matter wherever their futures take them. The impact this knowledge will have in their personal and professional paths will set the road for a cohesive, global and productive community focused on identifying assets and building upon them.
And this year feels particularly special.
The first group of Huntingburg students who began this Dual Language journey is entering middle school. In six more years, we will watch that first generation graduate.
Think about what that means.
Our community will have helped raise a generation of young people who have grown up learning two languages and developing the ability to navigate more than one culture. And after them will come another group, and another.
As an immigrant, I am proud to call this land my land.
As a parent, I am deeply grateful that this opportunity exists here. Some of you already know that we moved to Huntingburg chasing this program because I am certain that the three pillars that sustain the Dual Language Program; academic achievement, bilingualism and biliteracy, and sociocultural competence are not something we could fully provide our child simply by raising her in a bilingual home. They require the academic knowledge, intentional instruction, and lived experience that our school leaders and educators bring to this work.
And as a community member, I am excited about what these students will bring back to our region: knowledge, confidence, cultural understanding, a deeper sense of belonging, and the ability to connect with people across languages and cultures.
I think about the community they will help build, the workplaces they will enter, the families they will raise, the organizations they will lead, and the neighbors they will become.
We are not only teaching children two languages. We are preparing a generation with the skills to make our region stronger, more connected, and more prepared for the world they will inherit.
I hope we continue supporting the educators, families, students, and leaders doing the hard work of growing this program. And I hope we continue recognizing something I deeply believe about the future of our region:
Our multiculturalism is an asset. Our bilingual children are an asset. And investing in their potential is an investment in the future of Dubois County.
Rossina Sandoval Monsivais
ALASI Executive Director
