Learning the Language of Citizenship

They awake at 4 a.m. each weekday in their central Los Angeles apartment and, before first light, are soon hurtling in buses and trains en route to far-flung, low-paying jobs. But at day’s end, Alberto and Rosa Diaz still find time for intensive study of English and U.S. civics four evenings a week at an adult school near Chinatown.

“Citizenship is more important now than ever,” a fatigued Alberto Diaz said recently as the couple took a break from their three-hour class.

Although many people in Congress and elsewhere complain that immigrants aren’t learning English, tens of thousands of noncitizens like Diaz and his wife are signing up for intensive instruction that will help them become U.S. citizens. In many cases, there are not enough classes to accommodate would-be citizens.

Agencies providing instruction in English and U.S. civics--knowledge needed to qualify for citizenship--say demand has been increasing rapidly in recent weeks, from Orange County to Los Angeles to Ventura County. Mostly, those enrolling are the working poor, striving to stay on top of the bills in their adopted nation, with little free time in their schedules. And many have been in the country for a decade or more.

The heightened sense of urgency, observers say, is linked to the intensifying national debate surrounding the immigration issue.

Just this week, Congress approved a historic welfare overhaul that would sharply restrict public benefits for millions--including many legal immigrants--and the House approved legislation making English the nation’s official language. Looming in the background is a sweeping immigration bill that would, among other things, allow states to deny public education to illegal immigrant children.

“To be in America, you need English,” said Samuel Gunasmyan, a 42-year-old Armenian in the same class as the Diazes at the Evans Community Adult School, wedged between Chinatown and the Harbor Freeway in downtown Los Angeles.

*

With immigration developments widely disseminated by ethnic press and broadcast outlets, noncitizens have seen the writing on the wall and are hastening to improve skills mandated for citizenship. Adult schools, community organizations and other groups sponsoring classes are scrambling to meet the demand, sometimes with volunteer teachers.

Officials of the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s largest provider of citizenship instruction, say demand has yet to exceed capacity, although numbers at Evans and other district facilities are expected to rise through the summer and fall. About 55,000 people took citizenship classes in the most recent school year, said Domingo Rodriguez, administrative coordinator for programs in citizenship and English as a second language for the district.

“We’re expecting a huge increase this year,” said Rodriguez, who is gearing up to hire additional teachers for the anticipated jump in demand.

Other districts report growing waiting lists.

In Orange County, community centers and churches, schoolrooms and college classes are filled to the limit as they try to meet the ever-increasing demand for English classes.

Vietnamese, Hmong, Iranians, Mexicans, Central Americans, Europeans and people from all over the world are flocking to classes in English as a second language, program directors say.

The impetus for many residents to learn English is political, some educators said.

There has been an upward trend in enrollment since the emergence of Proposition 187, which would have restricted services to illegal immigrants. “Now with the welfare bill, a lot more people know that they’re going to lose benefits if they don’t become citizens,” said Vince Thackery, director of Community Resources Opportunity in Westminster.

At the East Valley Multipurpose Senior Center in North Hollywood, administrators have seen a sharp rise in inquiries about English language instruction and other classes that prepare immigrants to become U.S. citizens.

“We have been inundated with telephone calls,” said Geneva Ruiz-Hyatt, program coordinator for the center’s citizenship program. “People are terrified they will be left homeless, have their benefits drastically cut and have to go home.”

The shortage of classroom space angers immigrant advocates and educators.

“It’s a lot of baloney the anti-immigration people and the extremists are feeding us, that people don’t want to learn English,” said Emma Sirick, director of the Westminster site. “All our classes are always filled and people are always waiting. Some of my students are 70 years old, and this isn’t easy for them, but they do it anyway.”

El Concilio, an Oxnard-based Latino advocacy agency, has also seen a steady increase in the number of citizenship applicants it has assisted over the last few months, said executive director Francisco Dominguez.

The rush for such instruction reflects the unprecedented demand for U.S. citizenship among the nation’s more than 10 million legal immigrants. Applications are expected to reach 1.2 million in the current fiscal year, with more than one-quarter of them coming from Southern California.

But not everyone is thrilled with the surge in citizenship and the enhanced interest in English-language and U.S. civics training.

Glenn Spencer, who heads Voices of Citizens Together, deplored what he called a “cheapening of the [citizenship] process.”

“We would hope that these people are seriously interested in becoming part of our social fabric,” said Spencer, whose group is based in Sherman Oaks.

As quickly becomes clear in an evening spent in a citizenship class at Evans, people have many different reasons for wanting to become U.S. citizens. Some fear a cutoff of public benefits. Others are eager to vote, a privilege accorded only to citizens. Others want to bring family members to this country, something that is much easier for citizens. Others hope to get better jobs. Almost all say it will be better for their children. Many speak longingly of the desire to travel back home with a U.S. passport. Most voice some combination of reasons.

“I live in America now, and this is a country for work,” said Gunasmyan, 42, who arrived from Armenia almost five years ago with his wife and two children.

Trained as a chemical engineer in the former Soviet Union, Gunasmyan is now employed as a jeweler. His hope, he said in accented but good English, is that citizenship will help him get a better job. Without citizenship, his family could eventually lose almost $800 in monthly benefits under the new welfare measure. But Gunasmyan says that is not his principal motivating factor.

“Welfare makes you lazy, and this isn’t a country for lazy people,” Gunasmyan said as he sat at his desk during a citizenship session.

Evans is a kind of ground zero for prospective citizens. Citizenship classes, along with English classes not specifically tailored to citizenship applicants, are provided from 7 a.m. to 9:15 p.m. As in many of the centers, staffers also assist in taking applicants’ photographs and fingerprints, both needed for the citizenship applications. There is no charge, as is the case in most citizenship classes.

The special program of instruction, designed with assistance from the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, which administers the application process, amounts to a kind of cram course for prospective citizens. Teachers provide intensive coaching in the intricacies of government requirements. Courses at Evans are designed to last 60 hours.

Topics covered include instruction in filling out the needed forms and tips on assorted requirements--for instance, applicants must have been legal residents for at least five years and have demonstrated good moral character. Applicants are also coached in how to handle the all-important and often-intimidating INS interview, at which most must demonstrate their English skills and knowledge of U.S. government.

Because many applicants are apprehensive about visiting the INS headquarters, the agency has begun interviewing more than 1,500 applicants a week at schools and social service agencies. Most have already undergone citizenship training courses. Consequently, about 90% of applicants interviewed away from INS offices pass the exam, compared to fewer than 70% for those interviewed at the INS, said Richard K. Rogers, the agency’s district director in Los Angeles.

Citizenship applicants do not have to demonstrate English-language fluency, INS officials say, but must show the ability to field questions and speak English at a third- or fourth-grade level.

At Evans recently, under the direction of an English-speaking teacher, students divided into pairs and practiced the interview with each other. One person in each pair played the INS examiner, while the other was the applicant.

Some questions: Do you pay taxes every year? Would you help protect America? What is the Constitution?

The students’ enthusiasm was obvious, even though many had been working since early in the morning and were tired.

“For my part, I want to be able to vote, to give a voice for our people,” said Beatriz Mercado, a mother of seven, originally from Mexico, who was among those practicing her English.

A minivan driver who has worked as janitor and house cleaner and in sundry other jobs, Mercado says she is tired of being part of a voiceless minority. Like most others in the class, she said she agreed that welfare payments should be restricted--”I raised seven kids and never took welfare”--but she voiced reservations about possible reductions in federal Medicaid benefits for legal immigrants and cutbacks in school lunches for immigrant children.

*

English does not come readily to Maria Preciado, 46, who emigrated from Peru two years ago after being laid off from her job as a secretary. To her ear, English is not one language, but many. Preciado attends a class at Irvine Unified School District.

“But whenever I want to give up, I tell myself that my whole life will change when I can speak English--that’s why I carry my dictionary with me like it’s a bible,” Preciado said in Spanish.

“When I can speak English, I won’t feel so frustrated and so limited. I’ll be able to make more friends, and I won’t have to be embarrassed when someone speaks to me and I have to answer, ‘Sorry, I don’t speak English.’ ”

Times staff writers Andrew Blankstein, Carlos Lozano and Lisa Richardson contributed to this story.