Newport News Shipbuilding’s Hispanic Outreach and Leadership Alliance (HOLA) held its first-ever Spanish Immersion class in May.

The class is an experiment intended to allow shipbuilders to get out of their comfort zone culturally and linguistically, practice Spanish and meet others who share the same goal.

Due to the immersive nature of the class, as well as the occasional meetings, no official curriculum is held during the experience. Rather, the experience is focused on people getting used to just speaking Spanish in any way they can, and getting the opportunity to have a Hispanic dish they have never had before.

“I enjoyed being able to network with others while learning new words and phrases and how they differ depending on countries of origin,” said Khalyiah Brown (A572).

Others found it helpful that the class was separated by level of experience while the focus remained on speaking as little English as possible, as Jonathan Turner (E44) pointed out. “Everyone who attended showed interest in speaking Spanish the majority of the time. I liked that fact that it was close to a full immersion in the language,” he said.

HOLA members were taken by surprise in the interest shown for these immersion experiences and plan to continue hosting them as long as shipbuilders ask for them. HOLA will meet in a different Hispanic/Latino restaurant on a monthly basis on the third Wednesday of each month and is looking for ways to improve the experience for every shipbuilder who attends.

Shipbuilders who are interested in attending one of these immersive experiences should sign up on the HOLA website on MyNNS. No previous experience in Spanish is required to attend, and families are welcome.