North Charlotte Today

With about 20% of students having Hispanic/Latino roots, the Cabarrus County School District is making more of an effort to reach out to those families. This year, that included holding a Hispanic Family Resource Night April 12 at Jay M. Robinson High School in Concord, North Carolina.

By trying to connect in Spanish, the school district’s goal is to strengthen the trust the community has in school officials, according to a report by WBTV.

“The resource night for Hispanic families probably has a bigger attendance than probably any other resource night just because we do look for that and for the information in our language,” Willmarie Austin, a parent, told WBTV. “If we want to reach the Latino community, we have to have the information in our language and then we have to have staff who speak the language.”

The idea of removing communication barriers stems from the belief that education isn’t just for students during classes.

“What people need to understand is education is not 100% in the classroom, education is also very important with what happens outside the classroom,” Sandra Torres told WBTV.

Torres is the president of El Puente Hispano and works with the Cabarrus Health Alliance.

“We are also going to have vaccines from the Cabarrus Health Alliance, and we are going to have dental services also," she said.

The resource night had a strong impact within the community.

“It means a lot because a lot of people literally get lost in translation,” Austin said. “Being in the Latino community you work on trust anything that you do, you have to trust that business, that person, that school system.”