A state grant will help Weber State University kickstart a program to offer certificates and degrees through classes taught entirely in Spanish.

Believed to be a first-of-its-kind program in the nation, the “Building Puentes” program will ramp up after starting this fall, ultimately giving Spanish-speaking people opportunities to attain good jobs.

The Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity board, at its March meeting, approved a $5 million Industrial Assistance Account grant to help WSU start the program.

“The bottom line for this is really an opportunity for Utah to lead out in offering these first-in-the-nation programs completely in Spanish in an area with a population that we just expect to grow both here and nationally,” Jessica Oyler, WSU’s vice president of student access and success, told the board.

Ryan Starks, GOEO’s executive director, said that about 18 percent of Utah’s population is from Hispanic countries, a large percentage of the Utah population speaks Spanish, and the Ogden/Northern Utah area has a high number of Spanish-speaking people.

“We often see, though, that there is a disconnect between the Hispanic community and professional job opportunities because of language barriers,” Starks said.

The program eventually will offer advanced degrees in computer science, coding and other skills that “really support the market,” he said.

“We have a champion in Weber State who is willing to do that, and the state sees a lot of value in this,” Starks said. “I know the Governor’s Office is excited about this potential.” 

Oyler said Hispanics represent the nation’s fastest-growing demographic, which includes over 500,000 in Utah.

The program will begin with certificate programs in computer science, such as programming and cybersecurity, and entrepreneurship, offered online. It will advance to associate’s and bachelor’s degree programs, perhaps in health professions and early childhood education.

“We’re starting with these areas where there’s high industry demand and broad marketability,” WSU President Brad Mortensen said in a news release announcing the program. “We’re also providing this in a completely online format to meet the needs of our Spanish-speaking population.”

“We’ve done some research, and these are all areas that are projected to have growth in the coming years,” Oyler told the GOEO board.

The program will offer “stackable credentials” – courses designed to build on each other so that a certificate could count toward an associate’s degree, which could then count toward a bachelor’s degree in the same area of study. 

The program will begin this fall with several classes taught in Spanish, then further develop over the next five years, taking curriculum already taught in English and tailoring it for Spanish speakers. By 2028, the university plans to offer a bachelor’s degree in computer science, with plans for several other associate’s degrees. Weber will also offer nine certificates in skills such as web essentials, cybersecurity and other high-demand areas.

“We’re really excited to bring an opportunity like this to Northern Utah, to Utah overall, and certainly since it’s the first in the nation, we anticipate this to be a quickly growing and productive venture,” Oyler said.

Carine Clark, the GOEO board chair, stressed the need to use a wide variety of means to alert the Spanish-speaking community about the program. “I think we have to go really broad in just creating a wide net to make sure that we make this really easy for people to see the possibility here,” Clark said.

Jesse Turley, chairman of the GOEO incentives committee, said the program will be structured so that the vast majority of the instruction will be covered by Pell grants, with the Dream Weber program also helping to cover costs.

“Not only is this providing an educational platform for those that haven’t been able to reach education in a way that others have, but it’s going to be in a way that will be fully taken care of financially, so they’re not going to be straddled with debt,” Turley said.

Weber State plans to hire more Spanish-speaking faculty and staff, developing training and translating course materials into Spanish. “Our ultimate goal is student success in both the classroom and the workplace, so we’re going to offer additional bilingual support courses and services,” Mortensen said.

Students in the program will be placed in English-as-a-second-language courses most appropriate for their English language proficiency, which will serve as co-requisite courses to the content-based curriculum taught in Spanish. As the program grows, WSU will hire more bilingual academic advisors and tutors. The university also plans to award scholarships to help cover costs of course materials and the technology necessary to complete the program.

The university’s strategic plan includes a commitment to becoming an emerging Hispanic-Serving Institution with at least 15 percent of the student body identifying as Hispanic or Latino. “We’re focused on meeting prospective and current Hispanic students and their families where they are,” Mortensen said, “and helping them get where they want to go.”