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This case study illustrates the employment journeys and experiences of three Latinx fast-food industry service workers. Analyses of in-depth interviews reveals while participants share comparable employment histories, they also demonstrate differences in regard to the paths to management they have experienced, and their level of language confidence at work. All participants in this study have been offered and have declined management positions. First, this analysis suggests there is a myriad of reasons besides a lack of English language skills regarding why Latinx fast food restaurant workers may not assume management positions. These reasons include participants lacking the following: time to devote to English language study, desire to change their shift schedule, and adequate compensation for the managerial role. Second, this analysis suggests there may also exist a mismatch between the perception the fast-food worker has of their own language skills, and their manager/supervisor’s perception of their language skills and readiness to assume a managerial position. The mismatch points to a need for more English language education, which has the potential to bolster learner confidence and lessen the gap between employee and manager/supervisor perception of the employee’s language skills. This study argues for employer-sponsored English language classes to support the language learning journey of Latinx employees. In turn, this would benefit the workers in their personal and professional lives, as well as the fast-food restaurants, because the more confident and proficient the employees are in their English language capabilities, the more smoothly the restaurant will operate. LATINX FAST-FOOD WORKERS: EMPLOYMENT JOURNEYS & LANGUAGE NEEDS 2 Introduction In October 2018, I embarked on the most challenging and rewarding of my academic experiences: I taught my first ever English as a Second Language (ESL) class. This was a special kind of ESL class: a multi-leveled, multi-linguistic background, free class in North Portland, home to a sizeable immigrant population with many people identifying as Latinx. In those three months of creating and delivering curriculum that responded flexibly and creatively to students needs, I got to know three women in particular, and hear their stories. The three women are sister-in-laws, were born and raised in Mexico, speak Spanish as their first language, and all three work in fast-food, in line / prep cook positions. All three women have been offered management positions during their careers, which have spanned between six to twenty-three years in the fast-food industry alone. However, all three have turned down the management position offers, and cited language capability as a major factor influencing their decisions. This piqued my interest, and I created my thesis research questions to investigate the factors that influenced the three women’s decisions. While the three women inspired my project, I did also interview one participant who was not a member of the ESL class. It is my hope that by adding my voice to the conversation regarding workplace equality and the need for English for Special Purposes (ESP) adult education, I can provide a space for the voices of Latinx fast-food workers to describe their experiences. Finally, through this project I hope to articulate specific recommendations as to what kinds of ESL materials could be created and the manner in which they could be delivered to best benefit the participant population, adding my voice to the discourse community surrounding ESL pedagogy. I am extremely grateful to my participants for generously sharing with me their stories, perspectives, and time. LATINX FAST-FOOD WORKERS: EMPLOYMENT JOURNEYS & LANGUAGE NEEDS 3 Background The existence of vocational training programs in the U.S. has decreased consistently; between 2001 and 2017 federal appropriations for Department of Labor (DOL) job training grants have sharply decreased by 40% (“Adult Vocational Training” (n.d.)). According to Reich and Cho (2017), this trend in disinvestment in our nation’s workforce permeates many other programs as well; since 2001, Department of Education grants which have historically been used to fund programs that support technical schools, high schools, and career and technical education at community colleges have decreased by 34%.​ Additionally, the Department of Education is also responsible for administering grants which help fund adult literacy programs in conjunction with other programs which support the learning of many basic skill sets. Following the same trend, funding for these programs has also declined 23% since 2001 (​after adjusting for inflation) (Reich & Cho, 2017). It is important to note, however, that in 2014 the Obama administration did implement programs in support of contextualized education under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunities Act of 2014 (WIOA), and this relabeling of terms from “vocational training” to “contextualized instruction,” may have affected these statistics. While funding may still be reduced, there has been a resurgence of contextualized instruction in recent years. WIOA is in effect until 2020, at which point the current administration will evaluate and decide whether or not to continue to authorize the act. Educational systems are directly related to employment systems; according to Allmendinger (1989), "educational opportunities, and the specific structures of educational systems, are as consequential for mobility in labor markets as are the attributes of the individuals who make careers in those markets” (p. 231). Therefore, educational infrastructure directly LATINX FAST-FOOD WORKERS: EMPLOYMENT JOURNEYS & LANGUAGE NEEDS 4 impacts labor infrastructure and human capital. The structure of public education in the U.S. can be classified as a stratified system characterized by its failure “to equip poorer children with basic skills, combined with a longstanding under-investment in vocational qualifications” (Fleming, 2015, p. 4). Because of the contemporary lack of vocational training in the United States, the path to job-specific education can be unclear or hidden for people who are economically disadvantaged. This disconnect between vocational training and low-skill workers becomes all the more amplified in the case of populations who have been historically institutionally marginalized, such as people of color (POC) and immigrants, especially those who do not speak English fluently or whose English literacy is limited. In the United States, the restaurant industry is the ​single largest ​source of employment for POC, and the second largest employer of immigrants (Covert, 2013; ROC-United, 2013) (see chart at left). However, POC and immigrants are “disproportionately concentrated in the lowest paying [fast-food] positions” (Covert, 2013, p. 1). According to a report by the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (2013), the restaurant industry accounts for providing seven of the ten lowest paid job positions in the U.S.. When examined with an eye to racial representation, two of the LATINX FAST-FOOD WORKERS: EMPLOYMENT JOURNEYS & LANGUAGE NEEDS 5 lowest-earning job positions, dishwashers and fast-food preps and cooks, are 59% and 35% POC, respectively. In 2013, dishwashers nationwide earned a median wage of $8.78, while fast-food preps and cooks earned $8.85 (ROC United). According to the same report by ROC-United (2013), in 2013 Latinx people represented 47% of the fast-food workforce nationwide. All it takes is one visit to a Taco Bell, McDonald’s, Taco Time, Burger King, Dairy Queen, Burgerville, etc. to notice the obvious presence of POC in the kitchen and behind registers in the Portland area. According to Green et. al. (2015), in Portland “persons of color, especially Latinos, and non-citizen workers are represented in food services at a rate more than ten percent higher than the regional workforce overall” (p. 32). Many Latinx employees in fast-food restaurants in Portland are native Spanish speakers (although some speak Indigenous languages as their first language [referred to hereafter as L1], and Spanish as their second language, in addition to English as a third or additional language.) Several programs have been created to address the language needs of fast-food workers to support their success and professional growth in their industry, which fall under the term Contextualized Instruction​. Contextualized instruction refers to the process of providing contextualized literacy and language skills that respond to the demands of the work environment and career aspirations (Wrigley, 2015). By contextualizing and customizing instruction, the English Language Acquisition programs operating in contextualized instruction settings aim to cater to the specific needs of English Language Learners who may not have experienced much formal education in their lives, which can be the case of many new immigrants and refugees. Some of the specific skills English language acquisition programs aim to address understanding that many immigrants do not possess these skills prior to employment are: 1) English speaking LATINX FAST-FOOD WORKERS: EMPLOYMENT JOURNEYS & LANGUAGE NEEDS 6 and listening skills, 2) academic listening and comprehension skills, 3) written communication, and 4) the culture of work and training. Regarding speaking and listening skills, unlike for native English speakers, making the transition into a workplace with unique vocabulary pertaining to social interactions and technical tasks can be a real challenge for English language learners. In the case of one of the participants in this study, simply chatting with a coworker was very taxing when she first began her job and therefore created stress rather than camaraderie. Other tasks such as making requests, explaining mishaps when a machine breaks or when things don’t go smoothly, or providing an explanation to a customer regarding a lack

A Present-Situation Analysis and Needs Assessment of Latinx Workers in the Portland Fast-Food Industry: A Study of their Employment Journeys &amp; Job-Related Language Needs