The Rotary Club of San Luis Obispo has enjoyed a long-standing, 20+ year, relationship with the Rotary Club of Compostela, Mexico and we have partnered on many projects in the Compostela community. During a recent project needs assessment with the Rotary Club of Compostela, we learned that the Compostela residents had a strong desire to learn English, but available language teaching resources were very slim.
The Rotary Club of San Luis Obispo partnered with Cal Poly San Luis Obispo to develop an English Language Education Program for the residents of Compostela. Over the summer, a Cal Poly department head and three Cal Poly student-instructors lived in Compostela and taught three sessions of English each weekday to grade-school students, high school students, and adult residents. We paid all expenses for travel plus a small stipend for the instructors. The program was extremely successful for both the Compostelans, who learned an amazing amount of English in a short period of time, and for the student-instructors from Cal Poly who gained valuable vocational experience in a practical setting.