“I teach Spanish to students and also teach classes in the dual program, where students who are bilingual and more advanced in the language get to take classes like biology, language arts, and so on, but in Spanish. This program has progressed a lot since the beginning of my career here at Wilsonville. It’s been like 10 years now teaching here, and I was one of the co-creators of the dual language program. Watching how it develops, I feel proud at heart.

I just want everyone to be a part of it.”I want my students to understand not only the language, but the cultural piece behind the language. When you’re going to communicate in the Spanish language with somebody else, you have to think ‘where are they coming from?’ Am I going to use a formal language or a Spanish language? So my purpose is for the students to be aware of the multicultural piece and how that applies to the language.

It’s like trying to understand the language in a deeper, more meaningful way. My personal goal is for students to know the language and be able to communicate with people; to travel if they have the chance to travel. Then after the second language, my goal is for them to learn another language; like 3 languages or 4 languages. From Costa Rica I moved here, I worked in Chemistry, and slowly started moving into my career.

The Costa Rican culture… I want a lot of students to be exposed to those things. It’s most common for the culture from Mexico to be taught, but they don’t know about Costa Rica, Nicaragua, the way that we eat, the way that we express something; It’s why I try to use the ‘Pura Vida’ constantly. I find out that there are a lot of students that are from Guatemala and Salvador, but we don’t know each other. When I share that I’m from Costa Rica, they start bringing up, ‘Oh! I’m from Salvador! We eat the same thing here.’ So that’s also something I really love from teaching.”