When admissions season rolls around and Archer opens its doors to prospective students, tours, interviews and campus previews take place on any given day. As one of Archer’s initiatives to be more inclusive and diverse, these events are increasingly becoming available in Spanish.

Junior Angelica Gonzalez joined Archer’s ambassador team during the 2016-2017 school year. During her second year, Gonzalez was asked by Carla Alcala, the Associate Director of Admissions, if she wanted to help the admissions team develop Spanish tours. Gonzalez started by translating tours into Spanish, then she conducted the actual tours and now she is training other students to lead tours in Spanish. Gonzalez said she enjoys being able to “connect” with parents who don’t speak English.

“I have had talks with different parents that felt uneasy about bringing their daughter to Archer,” Gonzalez said. “After they speak to multiple teachers, and even us students, about our own experience in their own language they understand [Archer] more fully and can feel more at home or more comfortable coming here or sending their child here.” 

Andrea Ramirez, a freshman, toured in Spanish, and said the multilingual tours made her feel “invited.”

“When I was applying, my sister [led] a Spanish tour and my parents said they felt a lot more comfortable,” Ramirez said. 

Sixth-grader Micaela Lopez speaks Spanish at home, as her parents are fluent. However, Lopez toured and applied in English.

“If my parents knew [about the Spanish tours], they would have wanted me to take it,” Lopez said. “They did [the application process] in English.”

In addition to tours led in Spanish, Archer hosts a campus preview entirely in Spanish.

“What we do is we invite prospective families who speak Spanish at home to come to this event, and we conduct it all in Spanish,” Paik said. “We decided to do this event because we feel it’s important to engage as many families as we can in the process.”

The admissions office also offers interviews in Spanish if the parents would prefer that option.

“English is the primary language, but we respect and understand that families have other languages that they speak at home,” Paik said. “Once a student enrolls here, we will do our best to manage the relationship for the parents. Ms. Alcala has a handful of [Spanish-speaking] families that she keeps in touch with throughout the school year.”

According to Archer’s 2017 Diversity Report, Archer students come from 73 different zip codes. Paik expressed a desire to accommodate families from different backgrounds.

“I think we do a really good job to help families or any kind of family to begin with,” Paik said. “Whether they speak English only or multiple languages, we do our best to make the transition to our school as seamless as possible.”