Tuesday, June 7, 2011

The Golden Ticket


If you live in California and speak Spanish, you hold the " golden ticket."
Spanish speaking people are the fastest growing minority group in America and soon will become the majority according to U.S. Census.  Many of the new immigrants are choosing not assimilate but instead maintain their culture and language and not speak or learn English.

 English is the standard language of the United States. If you migrated here and want citizenship, you need to learn to speak English.

Bilingual jobs are in high demand.You are a very valuable employee if you are bilingual. Most employers offer higher pay in order to recruit and retain bilingual employees. There is a pay differential that can get you an extra 20% per hour hour or more. Most human service or customer service jobs need bilingual workers. If you speak Spanish you have the "golden ticket" to employment in law enforcement, medical, social work, hotels, banks and the list goes on.


 I just completed an intensive 12-Week post- bachelor internship program in the psychosocial rehabilitation model of mental health services. Each week I was required to apply for a job in hopes that I would be hired by the time the internship was over.  Before applying for this internship I had been unemployed for over two years and had sent out hundreds of cover letters and resumes with not response. I blamed the bad economy.  During the employment preparation lecture, the facilitator stood before the group and stated, "you have the golden ticket if you speak Spanish. This means you can maneuver in two worlds. Place that information at the top of your resume so it is seen right away." Hearing that information, I became a little discouraged. Nevertheless, I continued to apply for jobs. Now the internship has ended and I remain unemployed.

At the end of each job post were familiar words that disqualified me from a job I was otherwise qualified to do.
-Must be Fluent in Spanish
-Bilingual Spanish/English required
-Bilingual A Plus
-Spanish speaking required
-Bi-lingual Spanish preferred
-Must be able read/write Spanish

The moral of this post is: Get the "GOLDEN TICKET" or be left out!



Queen of Hearts