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SANDY — In her native Venezuela, Yris Alvarez taught at elementary schools and in universities.
Now living in West Jordan, she'd like to leverage that experience into a job in Utah. "I'd like to know what opportunities there are," she said.
Likewise, Utah education officials are eager to help immigrants like Alvarez, and on Monday they helped host a workshop meant to teach them how to parlay their foreign credentials into Utah teaching licenses. "We truly want these educators. We are welcoming them," said Patty Norman, deputy superintendent of student achievement at the Utah State Board of Education.
Utah needs teachers, added Malia Hite, executive coordinator of educator licensing for the board, and immigrants from abroad are an insufficiently tapped resource that can help meet demand. Dual-language and English-as-a-second-language programs, in particular, are an area where immigrants and their language skills could be of service, education officials say.
"These are people coming with experience that is often overlooked because they don't know how to navigate the system of licensing," Hite said.
Monday's event is just one of several outreach efforts state officials have helped organize to tap the labor potential of immigrants in Utah. Jeiber Sanchez, Alvarez's husband, thinks the effort is well worth it. He attended the workshop with his wife.
"It's a win-win situation," he said. Utah can beef up its workforce of trained professionals, he said, and the workers can work in professions they know instead of taking posts they may be overqualified for. Sanchez and Alvarez, who has a master's degree in education from Venezuela, left their home country with their three kids due to limited opportunities in the country, characterized by economic instability and tumult under the nation's socialist leadership.
Norman estimates "hundreds" have already gone through the streamlined credentialing process outlined in SB35, many of them from such countries as Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico and China. SB35, approved by lawmakers in 2023, smooths the process of getting Utah work licenses in a range of professions for those who trained and studied abroad.
Need for teachers is so acute, added Hite, that those getting a Utah license typically don't have much trouble finding work. "Once people have a license, if they want a job they can get a job," she said.
Mildred Valles, who has a college degree from Mexico in teaching and taught at a preschool in her native country before coming to the United States, took part in the workshop.
"I'm trying to figure out how to become a teacher here," said Valles, now living in West Valley City and teaching Spanish to senior citizens as a volunteer. "I'd like to get a stable job. I'm also interested in getting a degree here so I can have more opportunities."
Natalie El-Deiry, director of the Utah Center for Immigration and Integration, said a survey of more than 6,000 people from abroad who are now in Utah found that more than 80% of them had bachelor's degrees or higher. The pool also had an average of 11 years of professional work experience in their home countries.
Numbers like that have spurred efforts to help them take the steps necessary to turn their foreign credentials into Utah licenses, and El-Deiry helped organize the education workshop. Her office has helped coordinate similar workshops for immigrants with professional backgrounds abroad in other areas, like engineering, manufacturing and health care.
Valles said navigating the system seems hard, and many of those on hand Monday, maybe a 100 or so people, peppered organizers with numerous questions on the process. For starters, those wanting to tap the process created per SB35 must have work authorization in the United States. Undocumented immigrants may not take part.
Apart from that, a key step is getting transcripts that outline each and every class taken abroad and submitting them for review and evaluation by one of two entities: the Association of International Credential Evaluators or the National Association of Credential Evaluation Services. Those bodies help vouch for the validity of degrees earned abroad. Then Utah Board of Education officials conduct their own review of the paperwork submitted. Broadly speaking, Hite said, those with education degrees from abroad and a year of teaching experience in their home countries are eligible to apply for Utah teaching licenses.
While some have tapped into the new procedures outlined in SB35, El-Deiry thinks there are many more eligible to do so. Utah, she went on, could use the help they have to offer, the spur for outreach efforts like Monday's workshop. "Nationwide, there's a teacher shortage and we're not immune to that here in Utah," she said.
