All year round, Fresno City College offers English classes on all of their campuses for multilingual students. The “English for Multilingual Students” department offers nearly 30 courses to strengthen these student’s English skills and set them up for future English courses at FCC.
U.S. News article “U.S. News Special Report: Stockton, Calif., Is the Most Diverse City in America” ranks Fresno as ninth among the most racially diverse large cities in California. In a city as diverse as Fresno, citizens who don’t speak English as their first language may need extra help in their day to day lives.
On FCC campus, multilingual students can find support with reading and writing classes, grammar and speaking classes at all levels.
EMLS instructors Alyssa Tobar, Michael Takeda and Department Co-Chair Jennifer Vahanian are some of the many members of faculty that work to support these students.
“When you learn a language, it’s really hard, and especially if your pronunciation is off, and people in the community around you say, ‘I don’t understand you’,” Vahanian said. “So what happens naturally as we teach them and as we work with them, is their confidence improves.”
EMLS offers their classes at different language skill levels in person and online for fall, spring and summer semesters. EMLS faculty want to ensure the students that come to their programs have the skills they need to move on with their education.
“Whatever a student’s goal is, even if it’s just to learn some new vocabulary to share with their friends, or to be able to talk to their kids, [their] teacher, or to write an academic paper, whatever it is we’re here to help them reach those goals,” Tobar said.
EMLS has a large number of immigrant and refugee students that have come from all around the world. These classes bring people together and prepare them, not just for their future education but their future in the U.S.
“The thing [students] have in common is the desire to learn English, incorporate into local culture and activities is the thing that bonds them, regardless of country or language of origin,” Takeda said. “They are all coming from the same place, in terms of their fears and comfort being in a new country, even if they’ve been here for a while. Our job is to provide a safe place for them.”
Through the EMLS department, multilingual students get the tools and resources they need to succeed in their English classes. The EMLS classes that FCC has to offer, accommodate for students academic English skills of all levels and help them move forward.
The EMLS department’s mission statement states, “The EMLS department at Fresno City college is dedicated to assisting non-native English speakers improve their English skills, and offers tutoring, conversation practice, counseling and individual support so that students can achieve all their educational and career goals. The department supports all of our students regardless of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, status, accent and/or language.”
