A $3.5 million Hispanic-Serving Institution grant from The Department of Education is allowing Southwestern College to create a program that will streamline the educational pathway for future bilingual educators.
In partnership with San Diego City College, Mesa College and San Diego State University, SWC is creating a providing liberal studies students with support as they prepare to transfer into SDSU’s bilingual teacher credential programs.
At SWC the program will be called DEBER (Developing Effective Bilingual Educators with Resources) and led by English and education professor Michael Wickert, who has worked at SWC since 2005.
“From community college to university we really want to have a soft hand off,” Wickert said.
Through DEBER, students will have access to specialized support and counseling, and be able to familiarize themselves with SDSU by sitting in on classes, meeting professors and attending workshops before they transfer.
DEBER will also create a club so the program can be more cohesive, according to Wickert, where students and faculty can come together and interact outside of regular class time.
Wickert said bilingual education is important because it allows people to interact with ideas and people that they otherwise would not have interacted with, and the demand for it in the South Bay is only growing.
“We’re really embracing who we are as a border community and our relationship with Tijuana and Baja California. We can’t ignore that this is who we are,” Wickert said.
In the first year of the new program, Wickert aims to focus on student outreach and establish South Bay community partners that can provide additional support to DEBER.
Student participation in the program should officially start in spring of 2020, according to Wickert. There are a total of 1,191 liberal studies students at SWC. Wickert said he anticipates about 30 students that are pursuing bilingual education to take part in the program.
For more information about the development of DEBER, contact Wickert at mwickert@swccd.edu.
