Community Engagement in the English Language Academy

Greetings from the English Language Academy!

We are off to a great start in the ELA this semester. We have welcomed new students from China and Italy, and we have been up to our usual with community engagement.

Here are a few highlights of how we are tapping into our campus and larger community in order to learn, share, and gain new perspectives.

Last week, we participated in the Spring Diversity Forum’s Cultural Conversation event. Special thanks to our student Aurora Barassi from Italy and our peer mentor Montserrat Cuevas for volunteering to be table leaders at this all-inclusive campus event. All students had a chance to engage in conversations to explore topics ranging from clothing to social expectations and discuss how these topics relate to gender. We all appreciated a supportive and safe environment where we could listen to alternative views.

Aurora from Italy acted as a facilitator at the Diversity Forum.
Spring Diversity Forum Cultural Conversations event

Another event we participated in last week was our visit to Fairhaven. Every semester, our ELA students are paired with friends from Fairhaven to engage in multiple cultural exchanges. Some exchanges take place at Fairhaven and others are on our campus. Thank you to our Fairhaven partners for always being kind and helpful. We chatted about everything from holidays to World War II.

Blyth from China visits with his Fairhaven friend Dee Dee.

This semester we have also enjoyed educational visits to the Chamber of Commerce, The Book Teller, Roberta’s Art Gallery, Career and Leadership, our campus TV and radio stations, and more. We would like to thank our campus and community for always being warm and welcoming.

Leo from China and Pierre from France got to check out the TV studio during their tour of our campus radio and TV station. Thank you to Professor Lucas for showing us all of the amazing equipment and showing us what happens behind the scenes.

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