Post-Katrina New Orleans And ESL
Oscar Garza is a Latino construction worker whose picture appeared in the July 2006 issue of “Salud: A Health and Safety Quarterly for Farm Workers and the People who Serve Them.” The construction worker Oscar Garza is one of the many immigrants who are changing the face of New Orleans. In the picture, he stands below a sign that says “N’awlins style poboys sold here.”
Garza was one of the speakers at a symposium titled “La Nueva Orleans? Race and Immigration in Post-Katrina America.” Organized by Zocalo Public Square, a Los Angeles not-for-profit, Friday’s gathering examined the impact of immigrants as experienced in the United States in general and New Orleans in particular.
Much of what has happened and will happen in New Orleans as result of the Latino influx is not surprising. In fact, it has already happened in other parts of the country.
“If you are seeing a substantial influx in young Latino males coming here, you know to start planning to expand your kindergarten classes and to hire (English as a Second Language) teachers in five to seven years, ” said Roberto Sura, a professor at the University of Southern California’s Annenburg School of Journalism.
