Let's Translate Home-to-School Communications into the Languages Our Families Actually Speak
In this video, Dr. Justin Baeder discusses why schools must translate communications into families' home languages to genuinely include all parents in their children's education.
Key Takeaways
- English-only communication excludes families - Sending everything in English shuts out the families who need engagement most
- Translation is a basic equity measure - Multilingual communication isn't a nice-to-have; it's essential for inclusive schools
- Technology makes this easier than ever - Translation tools and services are readily available; there's no excuse not to use them
Transcript
translations make a big difference when it comes to communicating with families and getting families engaged with their kids education think about it if you got communication in a language that was not your first language that maybe you don't read in so well would you make the effort to read it and would you appreciate the person who sent it to you knowing that you don't speak or read in that language i think this is something that was so difficult for so many years that a lot of schools have just never gotten in the habit of translating.
Maybe it's not required by law, or maybe it's fairly few students in your school who speak a language other than English at home, but I think every school has multiple languages spoken among their families.
Probably almost every school in the United States has Spanish speakers, and in many schools, many, many languages are spoken.
And thankfully now, machine translation has gotten good enough that we don't really have any excuse, right?
It used to be that you had to hire a person who spoke each of the languages that you wanted to translate into, And then it was this whole process of, you know, getting the translation made and checked before you could send anything out.
And thankfully, it is so easy now with the tools that are available to us.
And that's not to say that they're perfect.
You know, I would not count on them 110% to translate perfectly accurately, but they are pretty...
good.
So let me know what you're using to translate.
I checked just now in S'more, the newsletter service can translate.
Let me know what else you're using to translate things into students' families' home languages so that they can more easily read what you're sending out so that they can feel like they're a part of your school community.
And I think a lot of the value here is symbolic, even for your families who are more than fluent in English.
It says a lot to say we value you.
It says a lot to say we care about communicating with all of our families and not just those who speak English as a first language.
So let me know what you think about this.
Is this an opportunity where we can reach more people, where we can better engage our families through translation?
Let me know and let me know what tools you use.