Access to Education: Promotores Bring Innovative Strategies to Reaching Community Members

As part of National Farmworker Awareness Week, Farmworker Justice recognizes the importance of education access for farmworkers. Education access impacts all farmworkers. From children who work in the fields, to farmworker children whose education can be interrupted by the necessary migration following crops, to youth who have difficulty applying for college because their transcripts are not coordinated across states, and to farmworker adults who often have received limited education through out their own lives. Farmworker Justice not only works in collaboration with other organizations to address farmworker children and youth issues but also address education access issues amongst adults through our promotores de salud programs.

Using the promotor de salud model Farmworker Justice partners with community-based farmworker organizations, trains a cadre of local promotores, and supports them as they conduct outreach among farmworker families and peers in their local communities. We are currently working with promotores to conduct outreach on issues such as pesticide safety, heat stress prevention, and workers’ rights. 

Read the full blog which includes a story from a promotor :

As part of National Farmworker Awareness Week, Farmworker Justice recognizes the importance of education access for farmworkers.  Education access impacts all farmworkers. From children who work in the fields, to farmworker children whose education can be interrupted by the necessary migration following crops, to youth who have difficulty applying for college because their transcripts are not coordinated across states, and to farmworker adults who often have received limited education through out their own lives. Farmworker Justice not only works in collaboration with other organizations to address farmworker children and youth issues but also address education access issues amongst adults through our promotores de salud programs. 

Using the promotor de salud model Farmworker Justice partners with community-based farmworker organizations, trains a cadre of local promotores, and supports them as they conduct outreach among farmworker families and peers in their local communities. We are currently working with promotores to conduct outreach on issues such as pesticide safety, heat stress prevention, and workers’ rights.

The following is a story from one of the promotores:

Juana's Story
“When I was young,” says Juana, a promotora with Alianza de Mujeres Activas (AMA) in Volusia County, Florida, “I didn’t have the opportunity to go to school very long at all. My family was very poor and I had to stay at home to help with chores. Once I came to Florida and started to work in the ferneries, it was just too late.” Juana grew up in Jalisco, Mexico and like many farmworkers received few opportunities for higher level education in her native country.

Juana describes her experience as a promotora over the last three years. “When I began I was so shy, and I thought to myself what kind of value do I have to be teaching those around me? I didn’t go to school for too long, and I only have my own experience to try to help show others the way. Will that be worth something to someone outside my own family?” This was Juana’s starting point and the beginning of her own transformation as she became more and more involved in conducting outreach in her community. “The answer to that question I asked myself is yes. I do have so much to teach others, and becoming a promotora is something you can do at any point in your life. It doesn’t matter if you graduate from school or not.”

It is critical that farmworkers are offered the opportunity to participate in many levels and facets of educational experience-both as teachers and learners. With innovative approaches to education and the willingness to step outside traditional methodologies, the scope of education can broaden and become more inclusive of all backgrounds and experiences.