Over the past 20 years, thousands of bilingual students have graduated from Memphis schools. Yet, the City of Memphis has not been able to harness these homegrown talents. Now, education advocates are working to change that. 

“Latinos are here. We’re here. We've been here,” declares Maria Oceja, a local advocate with 10 years of experience, and who led the organization of the first-ever Spanish-speaking candidate forum in 2023 ahead of the mayoral election.

On March 6, Oceja, a member of Mayor Young’s Transition Team, along with the members of the Good Governance Team, presented the mayor with their recommendations for best government practices. One of the key recommendations propose the City of Memphis include language support systems such as professional translators and translation for all public facing materials for Spanish, Arabic, and Vietnamese languages and ASL services where needed.

Moreover, the recommendation includes a 12-month timeline with goals such as an audit of City of Memphis services and identifying what services currently have language gaps or barriers. Another goal is to appoint 1-3 foreign language liaison(s) to the Mayor’s office that specialize(s) in translating for Mayor Young and City Council at public events and meetings.

“I was inspired to draft these recommendations and share them with the team after translating for Mayor Young at the “One Memphis” town hall at Gaisman Community Center,” Oceja recounts. “I noticed how difficult it was for the Spanish-speaking community to fully engage with Memphis city leadership because there is a language barrier. And it is imperative as part of good governance for city leadership to be able to engage with all of their constituents.”

Courtesy photoMultilingual Memphis Registration site.The vision for this recommendation extends beyond 12 months. A long-term recommendation proposes the City of Memphis establish a pipeline of foreign language talent from local colleges and universities to ensure professional opportunities in The City of Memphis post-graduation. This closes the gap between foreign language services and talent recruitment and establishment in the city.

Oceja is not alone. Joshua Nave, an adjunct Spanish professor and grant coordinator at Southwest Tennessee Community College, is leading efforts at the institution to ensure the skills of bilingual speakers are honed and developed. Nave organized the first-ever Multilingual Memphis Regional Conference at Southwest Tennessee Community College this year. 

“Part of my job is managing the activities of the grant which are focused on eliminating equity barriers,” says Nave. “One of the goals is to increase equity and inclusion awareness and training, and one of the ways that we thought that we could do that is by having our own conference on our campus and not only making it available to our faculty and to our staff, but also to open it up to our community partners.”

Nave relied on his connections as an instructor and community member to invite language professionals and community organizations working with Limited English Proficient speakers.

The free conference offered sessions from organizations such as Su Casa Family Ministries, Cazateatro, the Office of Multicultural Initiatives in Memphis-Shelby County Schools, and Southwest Tennessee Community College. 

Photo courtesy of Southwest Tennessee Community CollegeMultilingual Memphis Regional Conference coordinator and Title III Project Activities Director, Joshua Nave, UofM Assistant Professor of Spanish and conference keynote speaker, Brianna Butera, and student panelists Jacqueline Alaniz, Jennifer Joya, and Luis Lopez Gamez at the plenary session.
The information session led by Southwest Instructor of Interpretation and Translation, John Mark Maust, shared an overview of the Community College’s new Spanish Community Interpretation and Translation Technical Certificate. The certificate is meant to fill in the current gaps that exist in the workforce.

“What does the workforce need so that we can make sure that we're providing what the workforce needs,” says Nave. “We have a relatively significant heritage speaker population at Southwest and we wanted something that acknowledged the skill set that they had already developed and been developing and using since they were kids. They've been translating since they were kids.”

“The certificate is not a legal certificate, it will prepare students to pursue court or medical certifications and introduce students to the professional world of interpretation and translation,” he added.

Southwest is not the only educational institution that recognizes there is a need for translation and interpretation professionals. “There’s also a significant interest from Memphis-Shelby County Schools to actually embed the certificate program into the dual enrollment program,” says Nave. 

The inauguration of the certificate aligns with the vision Oceja has for the City of Memphis. “We need to find a base of bilingual community members,” says Oceja. “If the city can take on the expense of having each bilingual community member be a certified translator, that would be amazing. That's the dream.”

“Every single city council person needs to have a political translator for themselves, for their district,” she emphasized. “And they can't rely on just one person to do all the translating for them. They need to have somebody that is able to travel with them when they're making public appearances and speaking to the community.”