Professional Documents
Culture Documents
West Liberty Schools
West Liberty Schools
Here at West Liberty Elementary School, mathematics is about more than numbers and shapes.
Its a blending of two languages, two cultures, and two very different groups of people that have
come to inhabit this small town in rural Iowa. Like scores of rural communities across the
Midwest and Great Plains, West Liberty has been transformed in the past several decades by an
influx of newcomers, most of them Latinos who came to work in the big turkey processing plant
that sits just beyond the downtown.
In Willmar MN, a multicultural business center has been helping local immigrants start
businesses by offering microloans and advice on how to file taxes or figure a payroll. Local
leaders in Storm Lake, Iowa, started a bilingual health center to help poor and underserved
residents often immigrants. And officials in Monmouth, Ill., worked with a political class at the
local college to study best practices in 34 towns across the Midwest that had meatpacking plants
and large immigrant populations.
But West Liberty has gone further than most towns toward turning an influx of immigrants that
most American of phenomena from a potential problem to a source of possibility. There have
been challenges. Some people simply left town as Spanish became an unofficial second
language, and differences persist. But today, interest in the city schools dual-language program
is so high among both Anglos and Latinos that there is a waiting list. Indeed, for many,
becoming the first majority-Hispanic town in Iowa is looking more like cultural addition than
subtraction.
Making Spanish equal to English in the schools is just one of the ways that West Liberty (pop.
3,736) has accommodated its Hispanic residents. Similar efforts can be found at City Hall, in the
police department, and at a range of businesses and civic institutions. At the annual Muscatine
County Fair parade, the biggest event of the year in West Liberty, taco and egg roll concessions
join the Rotary Clubs popular turkey leg stand, while the horses of Mexican cowboys, the
vaqueros, close out the show.
Its been a good change over the years, says Mike Duytschaver, a 37-year resident and
president of the local school board.
Anglo residents have a strong incentive to welcome immigrants. Many residents say immigrants
have helped the town avoid the fate of many rural communities, with their dwindling populations
and dying downtowns.
raise questions about the program its expensive, and some worry that it draws resources away
from the rest of the curriculum parents pack school board meetings to defend it.
He had a lot to learn, he says. But he was willing to do it. New Hispanic hires were
indispensable; they not only brought new customers, they taught Thoma new ways of doing
business.
Its not an easy change to make, he says. It took me a while to gain the trust of the population
in town to feel that this is an OK place for Latinos to shop. Some businesses are doing this
better than others, he says.