Luis Angel Rodriguez wants to improve his appeal on the job market, and the key to his future could lie in the hands of Penn students.
At least, if they follow the lead of students at Stanford.
A program called Habla la Noche -- run out of Stanford's El Centro Chicano, the hub for Latino students -- pairs volunteers with janitors on campus who want to learn English as their second language.
Habla was formed in 2001 when a student-led labor-advocacy group negotiated with the service workers' union, Stanford senior Eric Eldon said. Members of the local Service Employees International Union -- which represents many of Stanford's service workers -- said ESL classes would be the best way for students to help.
There are several ESL tutoring projects at Penn, but no program currently exists that pairs students with service employees. Several employees, though, voiced support for such a project.
Rodriguez, who works in Huntsman Hall, said he would be interested in working with Penn students if a program were available.
"The majority of people are thinking ... that we don't want to grow in different ways," Rodriguez said. "If we start to learn English ... this way we can get better jobs ... not only janitors' jobs."
Ethel Gurley, Rodriguez's co-worker, said the Penn students she has encountered were always willing to assist her.
"They're not scared to help you," Gurley said. "They'll take time and show you."
Eldon said that the tutoring at Stanford has helped participants develop crucial English skills.
"Most of the workers don't speak English because they're first-generation immigrants," Eldon said. "I was meeting real people who had an outsider's perspective of the Stanford community even though they were working here with everybody else."
Eldon said that the program not only allowed workers to improve their English skills, but also helped combat elitism among students.
"The goal of the program is to break down barriers that lead people to think they're better than other people," Eldon said. "We're not here to tell the workers what they're going to learn."
Eldon said that Habla's partnership with the union helped ensure the program was tailored to the janitors' needs.
"Having all these different linkages to all the aspects of the workers' culture and environments where they feel comfortable" helps strengthen the program, Eldon said.
Eldon added that the busy schedules of both students and janitors sometimes interfered with tutoring.
"The goal is for people to work together as long as possible," Eldon said. "It doesn't always work out that way."
Though members of the union which represents janitors at Penn -- the Local 115 of the Teamsters Union -- could not be reached for comment, other Philadelphia unions seemed receptive to the idea.
K.C. Ellis, spokesman Local 36 of the SEIU, said he would be interested in pursuing an education program for union members with Penn volunteers.
"I'd be happy to hear anything that the University of Pennsylvania would like to propose," Ellis said. "We haven't really explored that option, but it sounds interesting."
Cheryl Feldman, the director of the 1199C District of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Training and Upgrading Fund, said relying on volunteers for worker education might take away jobs from unionized employees, however.
"We want to be careful because as a union, we support volunteerism, but we also want to make sure that people are getting paid for their services," Feldman said.
