David Block has worn many hats here at Moraine Park.  He began working at MPTC in 2011 as an ELL instructor at the Dodge County Jail.  He has taught ELL at the Rosendale Dairy and on the Beaver Dam campus, and he served as the ELL Program Specialist in Fond du Lac.  He is currently our wonderful full-time ELL instructor at the Fond du Lac campus and we are sad to see him retire from his position at the end of the Fall 2021 semester.

When David was younger, he never thought that he would be an English teacher.  According to David, “English was not my favorite subject in school.”  This all changed when he relocated with his family to Peru to do mission work.  There, he served as an administrator and an instructor for a religious organization.  The focus of the mission work was on earthquake relief after an 8.1 Richter scale earthquake caused significant damage to the country in 2007.  He and his young family lived there for 15 years.  His experience moving to Peru with his family has given him great perspective on all the challenges that his students face when moving to a new country.  He appreciates how brave our ELL students are to take on such a big change and to “start a new life where the language and the culture are totally different.”  David “is glad to be a part of their process [to help them] to better integrate into their new ‘home.”’

One of the things that David enjoys most about his job is getting to know his students and learning about their cultures and individual stories. He appreciates being able to connect with so many students from different countries and cultures and to foster friendships amongst his students through English classes.  David has found joy and gratification in “helping students take next steps towards achieving their dreams [and] watching as they stretch their wings and fly.”  And his students are very grateful for the time and support that David has given to them. We asked his students to describe David, and here are some of the words that they used: warm, patient, tolerant, responsible, awesome, and excellent. He must be an excellent language instructor to have taught his students such dynamic vocabulary!

David has been a wonderful leader and mentor to our team of instructors in the Adult Ed. department.  He has been an invaluable asset to Moraine Park Technical College, to his many wonderful students, and to the greater Fond du Lac Community.   We wish him the best in his retirement and throughout the next chapter of his life.

!Hola!: “O-la” Means “hello” in Spanish.

Meet our English student Eliud Justo. Eliud is from Ixtapaluca, Mexico. He has been living in the United States for seven years.  In Mexico, Eliud worked for Coca-Cola for over 25 years. Here in the United States, Eliud works for the Elbe family at the Golden E dairy farm helping with the milking process.

He has been working on the same farm for the past seven years. Throughout the day, Eliud helps to milk 2,500 cows. That’s a lot of milk! Eliud lives in Fredonia, Wisconsin, and often makes trips to visit family in Sheboygan and Milwaukee. He enjoys eating seafood and highly recommends Tsunami in downtown Milwaukee.  

Eliud has been taking English classes here at Moraine Park for two years. In his job, many people speak Spanish.  He wants to learn English so that he can better communicate with people outside of work and hopes to teach English to others when he retires and moves back to Mexico. He is always encouraging his coworkers to try English classes and to embrace the language.  

If you are interested in classes, please reach out to Tony Rodriguez at 920-887-4496 or 262-306-5302 arodriquez@morainepark.edu (West Bend and Beaver Dam) or Becky Melo 920-924-6339 rmeloenriquez@morainepark.edu (Fond du Lac).

สวัสดี : “S̄wạs̄dī” means “hello” in Thailand!

Meet our English student Suchanat Buckman, known by many as “Kate”.  She is from Roi Et, Thailand and has been living in Wisconsin for a little over 2 years.  In Thailand, Kate worked in jewelry design and designed both her and her husband’s wedding bands.  She is a very talented seamstress as well.  During the pandemic, she has been designing, creating, and selling beautiful fabric masks.  What an entrepreneur!  

Kate recently started a job working at Goodwill Industries pricing clothing.  Her coworkers and managers love her friendly and positive attitude.  In April, she was awarded with Employee of The Month.  Way to go Kate!

Kate  is an ELL student here at Moraine Park.  She has been taking classes here since May of 2019.  Kate also participated in computer classes in our Student Success Center (SSC) with Shannon Huberty.  Using the skills and language learned from these classes, we were able to help Kate apply and interview for her job.  

If you are interested in classes, please reach out to Tony Rodriguez at 920-887-4496 or 262-306-5302 arodriquez@morainepark.edu (West Bend and Beaver Dam) or Becky Melo 920-924-6339 rmeloenriquez@morainepark.edu (Fond du Lac).

Moraine Park Technical College, in partnership with the Specialty Cheese Co., worked to develop a training to benefit employees. Harley Lemkuil, Training Specialist at Specialty Cheese identified a need for English Language Learning (ELL) classes and began seeking out options in 2019. 

“At Specialty Cheese, we treat language skills like any other skill that an employee may possess,” Lemkuil said. “We know that language can be a barrier to personal growth- and lack of personal growth affects company growth. We want our employees to succeed and helping them to build English speaking skills is one way to do that.” 

Lemkuil worked directly with supervisors to identify employees whose English skills were at a point where they could communicate at work but in a limited fashion. Employees could participate if they wished, but the training was not mandated. Once participants were identified, they assessed everyone by asking a series of questions and ensuring that participants were comfortable through the process. Lemkuil then took the data he gathered from employees and worked with Moraine Park’s Economic and Workforce Development (EWD) department to develop an ELL training plan.  

“Moraine Park helped provide good insight into the different learning styles and were very flexible with the training during the Pandemic,” Lemkuil said. “We initially planned for the training to be in-person, but the COVID-19 pandemic halted that possibility. Moraine Park was able to seamlessly transition the learning material to be done over zoom meetings.” 

As with many industries, the transition to an online platform offered some valuable learning opportunities for the organization as well.  

“The online format made it more difficult than usual to keep the employees engaged with grammar material,” he said. “Jennifer Elliot, the Moraine Park ELL instructor, made some innovative changes such as finding a printed publication that included the employees, to heighten engagement. Through that, we learned that the more personal the material, the more likely the students are to engage and practice their grammar skills.” 

The goal of providing this round of training was to help employees who wanted to grow their language skills. For this reason, Lemkuil relied on anecdotal feedback from the employee participants to access effectiveness, rather than testing each participant. However, he is hoping that future ELL programming will include a more subjective analysis of the program.  

Lemkuil is looking at program growth the same way he approached the start of this training- slow, thoughtful, and taking into consideration the needs of employees.  

“It’s very important to not only have the commitment of your employees but to also create an environment where the employees are free to practice their skills,” Lemkuil said. “This is a crucial step in getting the learning process. If an employee uses new grammar topics and is made to feel embarrassed by native English speakers, that employee isn’t going to want to practice their skills ever again.” 

By creating an atmosphere that fosters growth and inclusivity, Lemkuil is opening the doors of possibility for his employees.  

“In the coming years, Specialty Cheese would like to provide this opportunity to all employees who are interested in learning English,” he said. “The goal is to provide a more convenient class location which helps improve attendance to the program. It’s an ambitious goal, but we are confident that this continued training will be a benefit all around.” 

For more information, visit morainepark.edu/training. 

There are 7.442 billion people in this world, 6,500 languages, and 4,200 different religions. Our world is full of diversity, yet most will experience very little of it in their lifetime.

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Do you enjoy meeting new people? Do you like practicing intercultural communication skills? Do you wish to expand your knowledge about different viewpoints on family, food, education, success, gender roles, and even religion in a safe, respectful environment?

You may be thinking, “WOW, that sounds interesting!” Our students at Moraine Park Technical College are doing just that!

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Eat a grape and make a wish! Have a competition of nativities. Wear yellow pants to ensure good finances in the coming year! These are just a few of the cultural traditions Moraine Park’s English Language students shared during our end of the semester holiday-themed classes. We kicked off the holiday conversation with a trip to Regner Park’s “Enchantment in the Park” lights display where the students learned about the United States’ holiday traditions including Christmas lights, Santa Claus, carolers and hot cocoa. Continue reading

This week, students in our English Language Learner (ELL) class enjoyed coupling language learning with team-building skills through “The Marshmallow Challenge.”  Modified from an activity discussed in Mark Wujec’s TED talk, the students were tasked with working together in teams to build the tallest structure in a limited amount of time, from a limited set of materials.

They did a wonderful job creating some very unique free-standing structures! Continue reading