by John Moore
Staff Writer
On Thursday night, April 22, Bryan students met in Mac’s Café with Pastor Manuel Castro and his wife Carolina to hear the story of their calling to Dayton as missionaries to the local Hispanic community.
It was last fall when Junior Ruth Ebel, a Spanish major at Bryan, began attending Dayton Hispanic Church of God. Not long after, Ebel began helping with an English tutoring program offered by the church to the local Hispanic community, “Inglés sin borras.”
Junior Jandi Heagan and seniors Nate Rogers and Bryan Alfano soon joined Ebel in both attending the church as well as helping with the tutoring program.
“It just kind of started,” Heagan said, referring to their group who quickly became involved in the church’s outreach to the community.
Castro and his wife, originally from Mexico, began Dayton Hispanic Church of God four years ago. In the words of Castro, the church is not only a place to meets people’s spiritual needs but also their physical needs. Castro said the vision of Dayton Hispanic Church of God is simply to “serve the community.”
“English is one of the needs.” Castro said of the Hispanics in the area; but the church offers other learning resources as well. Classes range from computers and English to Spanish literacy skills, which offers a certificate of education recognized by Mexico that is the equivalent to the GED.
Regarding difficulties found within the tutoring program, Rogers said, “For a lot of the people in the class, Spanish is their second language.”
While the tutoring program was offered only on Tuesday nights, Bryan students have now begun helping with tutoring at the church on Monday mornings as well.
In regard to the coming school year, Heagan said, “Our plan is to continue what we’ve started.”
Students hope to strengthen and build the connection between Bryan and the local Hispanic community.