Increasing numbers of immigrants with limited English skills coupled with frozen or decreasing funding for language classes these people need provides Central Minnesotans with long and short-term challenges. The long-term challenge is to lobby the Minnesota Legislature &045; and even the federal government &045; to provide more aid, especially for classes that teach adult immigrants the language skills they need to find and retain jobs.

Given the fiscal conditions facing the state and nation, it likely will take some time to accomplish that, so in the short term, Central Minnesotans can offer help in other ways.

One easy way to start would be for businesses to donate funds that could be used to provide more classes.

Scott Wallner leads the Central Minnesota Adult Basic Education program, which covers 13 area school districts, including St. Cloud. ABE provides English as a second language classes in addition to other programs such as GED and family literacy classes.

The past few years have been tough on ABE programs. While demand has increased by about 30 percent, state funding, which accounts for 90 percent of the budget, was cut by $150,000.

As a result, Wallner revamped programs to get the most out of 17 mostly part-time staffers and started relying more heavily on volunteers to help with ESL. The good news is that the number of hours ABE spends with students has jumped to 68,000 a year.

Realistically, that likely won’t grow much more simply because program funds and volunteers are running at maximum capacity.

However, more students could be helped if more funds were available. And considering businesses benefit when they hire qualified immigrants, it only makes sense for them to lead efforts to provide more resources.

Perhaps groups like the Chamber of Commerce or Community Foundation could coordinate such efforts.

Wallner said ABE has taught in business settings in the past, but 9-11 and budget cuts curbed those efforts. Just recently, though, ABE has rekindled these efforts and hopes to strengthen that connection soon.

&045; St. Cloud Times