Iowa State University Extension and Outreach has received $5,000 from State Farm to support volunteer and local organization staff training for ¡Salir Adelante! The new, culturally tailored, research-based and evidence-informed curriculum promotes career and college readiness among Latinx youth and their families.
"We appreciate State Farm's generosity. This gift will help support 25 individuals to be trained to implement ¡Salir Adelante! in their communities," said Kimberly Greder, a professor in human development and family studies and a family wellbeing extension state specialist.
The funding will cover registration fees for volunteers and staff of local organizations who want to be trained to implement ¡Salir Adelante! in their community in partnership with ISU Extension and Outreach. The State Farm funding supported a training held earlier this month and will support another training to be held in the fall, Greder said.
Fallon Reicks is an extension educator from Clarke County who participated in the March training.
"At 34% Spanish speaking, Clarke County is rapidly changing in demographics. We need support from community members to empower under-represented populations, specifically the Latinx community. ¡Salir Adelante! is one action step we can take toward our goals," Reicks said.
Training participant Nayely Hurtado said, "I think Clarke schools would benefit from ¡Salir Adelante! because it would improve their family outreach and communication with the Latino community. Students and parents (Latinos) are often excluded from college info due to lack of language access or experience. Hearing about it during middle school will improve the lifelong outcomes of the families involved. Help is needed to improve this community's graduation rates and postsecondary education access."
ISU Extension and Outreach delivers "¡Salir Adelante! Caminos a Nuestro Futuro (Pathways for Our Future)" in partnership with community-based organizations and volunteers. The curriculum affirms and builds upon knowledge, experiences, and strengths of Latinx families and connects them to information and resources to reach their goals.
Salir Adelante participants.Through previous community-based research and extension programming with Latinx families, Greder and her colleagues learned strategies to specifically address the interests of Latinx families and effectively engage them in educational programming.
"The ¡Salir Adelante! curriculum was informed by direct research with Latinx families in Iowa. We conducted individual and focus group interviews with fathers, mothers and youth, and surveyed over 1,000 Latinx youth and parents who had previously participated in extension education," Greder said.
"When Latinx families in Iowa talk about education and their hopes for their children's future, they often say 'salir adelante' to describe moving forward to reach goals. That's why we chose this Spanish phrase as the name for this curriculum," Greder said.
ISU Extension and Outreach trains teams of extension educators and community partners to facilitate ¡Salir Adelante! locally. Thirty extension educators and 55 community partners from 15 Iowa communities already have been trained. Anyone interested in bringing the program to Latinx families in their community may contact Greder at kgreder@iastate.edu or Rosa Gonzalez, human sciences specialist in family wellbeing, at rdegonza@iastate.edu, for more information.
Categories: Iowa, Education