Ninth annual Immigrant Voices shares local spoken stories Thursday in Willits

English in Action will have its ninth storytelling experience, Immigrant Voices, at The Arts Campus at Willits at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 10. The event features six spoken stories from the lives of the students and Roaring Fork Valley community members, providing a forum for audience members and speakers to forge connections and share diverse life experiences. 

English in Action is a local nonprofit that aims to build community and intercultural relationships through language development, according to a press release. Their Immigrant Voices program, which began in 2017, is a way for English in Action students to practice public speaking, telling stories from their lives in front of a crowd. 

“I think that people laugh and cry every year at this event,” said Rachel Schmidt, Marketing and Events director at English in Action. “Audience members can relate to a lot of the stories, and they learn a lot from the story. It informs their knowledge of the experiences that many immigrants coming to this country share.” 

English in Action tutors around 400 individuals annually, with just short of 300 volunteer tutors. Students receive English language instruction from the tutors, often in one-on-one sessions that meet students where they are. 

Of those 400, six speak at these Immigrant Voice events. Speakers receive additional tutoring in workshops that develop their public speaking skills and ability to tell a story in a compelling way, according to Schmidt. 

The speakers receive training from Alya Howe, the founder of Write Large, a program aimed to bring true, unscripted stories to live audiences in the Roaring Fork Valley. 

“Just imagine coming out and speaking in public in your non-native language,” said Howe in the press release. “That courage shines through these stories, and we see how people from different cultural backgrounds often share the same experiences.”

Real-time Spanish interpretation is available to listen to the speakers. For many in attendance, this helps them connect with the story, including other students at English in Action. 

“I think storytelling can connect people across cultural divides, and that’s really central to what we do at English in Action,” said Schmidt. 

For more information and to register, visit https://tacaw.org/calendar/immigrant-voices/.