Staffing early childhood education centers has been a challenge for several years in Colorado. Front Range Community College may have an answer.
Gloria Kat, executive director of The Family Center in Fort Collins, is approached often by people looking to work in her early childhood education center. She, unfortunately, has to turn many of them away because they don’t have the right credentials.
According to Kat, a barrier for many Spanish-speaking individuals to enter the early childhood education profession is the lack of classes in their native language. Several start, but find the courses to be too challenging or stressful, and drop out. This decreases the amount of money they could make and the skills they could bring to the industry. Also, positions that need to be filled in the centers remain empty.
Looking to solve the problem, Kat reached out to FRCC to inquire about early childhood education classes that are offered in only Spanish.
“There is not a single solution for the childcare crisis,” Kat said.
Leah Morley, online lead/faculty for Early Childhood Education at FRCC, saw an opportunity that had never been done before at FRCC. For most of the past year, Morley has worked with various departments at FRCC to create two introductory courses in early childhood education that will be offered in Spanish — ECE 1011 Introduction to Early Childhood Education and ECE 1031 Guidance Strategies for Young Children. These courses are also offered in English.
“This is a milestone in the Early Childhood Education field, if we want to ensure qualified teachers fill the positions in the early childhood sector, we must increase educational opportunities for a fast-growing population of dual language learners and remove the barriers to achieving a professional degree.”
The classes will begin in Fall 2023 and enrollment is open now. If students enroll in both classes, they will earn an Assistant Teacher certificate, allowing them to advance beyond entry-level positions. The two courses offered are also the start to every Early Childhood Education certificate or degree, Morley said.
While these two courses are the only two in the program currently offered in Spanish, Morley hopes to continue adding two more within the program each semester until all Early Education course paths are offered in Spanish. Funding and interest will be the largest barriers, she said.
FRCC has received state funding that will cover fees and tuition costs for both courses, according to Morley. Those who may not qualify for state funding will still be covered through the college, she said.
“At least for this first semester, we are going to make sure that every single student is covered — their full tuition and fees — for these two courses,” Morley said.
Each course is fully online, allowing for anyone in the state to take the classes. FRCC will open 25 spots per class with the hopes they have more interest than places, Morley said.
“The ECE Department at FRCC recognizes the necessity of providing learning opportunities for Spanish-speaking students to support the growing population of Latinx families in our area. With the development of these courses we hope to remove the barriers students face when obtaining their ECE credentials and foster a diverse and highly-qualified ECE workforce in Colorado,” Morley said.
Students interested in the courses can email [email protected] for more information or to get signed up.
