DENVER —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
Now she’s giving Qdoba employees a chance to improve their English. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
At the suggestion of Qdoba employees who waited on Smith, the chain hired her this summer to teach a pilot English-as-a-second-language class for a select group of Spanish speakers here. Operations and human resources managers hope to use the class to develop future managers and make hourly employees more confident in their interactions with English-speaking customers. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
A month into the class, some of the students already seem more confident in their English, said regional manager Brad Fleck. That confidence is helping assure that food safety training is getting through to front-line workers who might have to field customers’ questions, for example, about the possible linkage of chiles to a salmonella outbreak. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
“I was discussing the situation with jalapeños with one of the students, Sylvia [Nevarez], asking her, ‘Do you understand?’ and she said, ‘I got it, Brad,’” Fleck said. “Before, I would probably have had to call another manager over to help get the point across. She just became a shift supervisor, and you can see the confidence in her when she runs her shift.” —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
Helping employees improve their English has been a long-term goal for Wheat Ridge, Colo.-based Qdoba, the 434-unit fast-casual arm of Jack in the Box Inc. The chain, which has about 330 franchised branches, also uses the Sed de Saber touch-screen computer program for bilingual education of workers. In addition, managers are allowed to use some of their store budget to assist employees in paying for a language tutor or classes, human resources manager Alison Peterson said. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
Peterson coordinates the class taught by Smith at the Qdoba restaurant in the Denver Tech Center. Students meet every Tuesday and Thursday from 2:30 p.m. to 4 p.m., during the unit’s slowest time of day. The handful of customers who come in during class time appear mildly curious about the group poring over their workbooks, conjugating verbs and discussing adjectives. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
About 20 students who come from 11 different stores in the southern metropolitan Denver area have been attending since June. The pilot program will end in August when Smith returns to her regular teaching job, but she and Qdoba are discussing ways to continue the class after Labor Day. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
“This is a breath of fresh air compared to teaching high-school and middle-school students,” Smith said. “The students want to be here and are very excited to learn.” —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
As soon the lunchtime shifts end, the students hurry from their stores around town to the unit in the tech center. For some it takes 30 minutes or more to get there. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
The time and trouble are definitely worth it, said Qdoba server Ana Nuñez. Although she came to the United States from Durango, Mexico, when she was a teenager and spent three years at a local high school, the ESL class has helped Nuñez progress much further in her English. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
“In high school, the teachers did not speak Spanish,” she said. “Here if we want to know something, we can ask her [in Spanish] and she will explain.… We learn more how to express and say what we think in English.” —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
Most of the students know enough work-related English to get by, said Smith, so she is focusing on helping them improve their writing and reading skills. —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
“I wanted to focus on being biliterate instead of just bilingual,” Smith said. “Being able to read and write in addition to speaking and understanding—that’s a skill that would be necessary in terms of management positions.” —Being a regular at a Qdoda Mexican Grill restaurant gave middle school Spanish teacher Lacey Smith a chance to practice the language with native speakers.
