This story was written by Lia Salvatierra, our new Education Reporter. Find more of Lia’s reporting here. Do you have an NKY education story? Email lsalvatierra@linknky.com.
A grinning soon-to-be second-grader fished through a lasagna tray, grabbing squares of cardboard etched with words.
It was a game he was playing with another student who was learning English, and two high school Spanish students to practice reading and sounding out words.
They were at a free, weekly tutoring program at FIESTA, a nonprofit founded to support Northern Kentucky’s growing Hispanic population.
The classroom was filled with rising first- and second-grade English learning students and rising sophomore and junior Spanish students from Notre Dame Academy.
Theresa Cruz, FIESTA’s founder and chief executive officer, launched the program after hearing from parents concerned about their student’s ability to pass Kentucky’s new end-of-year reading tests.
Passed in 2025, House Bill 240 created new requirements for holding back kindergarteners and first graders if they don’t pass those tests.
Cruz said the law hit English learning students and their families especially hard.
She called up Notre Dame Academy Spanish teacher Sister Maria Francine Stacy, a regular FIESTA volunteer who’d mentioned her students were interested in more opportunities to work with Spanish-speaking communities.
Hearing about the situation from Cruz, “I said ‘OK girls, we’re going out there,’” Stacy said.
With the help of another Notre Dame Academy teacher, they got to work arranging a reading tutoring program that started before the end-of-year testing and has run through the summer.
One of the first parents to register her English learning students has rising second- and third-graders at Kenton County Schools.
She applauded her sons’ English as a second language teachers, but said her youngest still needed more help getting on the same level as his peers.
“I’m really grateful because, in reality, extra classes are really expensive,” she told LINK nky in Spanish.
She said she’s already seen her sons improve.
But the program has become something bigger than practicing phonics and pronunciation, or preparing for tests, Cruz said.
“It’s also the benefit of having people come together that are completely different, and having them work toward the same goal,” Cruz said.
Frances Maier, a junior at Notre Dame in the tutoring program, told LINK nky she enjoys using her language skills to teach others.
She also tutored adults in English at the Kenton County Library’s Covington Branch.
“I think it’s important because a lot of these families are struggling, and I’d like to help them in any way possible, to make them feel welcome and to foster more community,” she said.
Stacy said the program brings immense value to both sides.
“Hardly ever do our students ever see it as one way,” Stacy said.
“It opens them up more linguistically, and it opens them up to the human experience,” she said.
Cruz said though the program was created for kindergarten to third grade students with Notre Dame Academy students, it’s open to all interested students and volunteers.
Lia Salvatierra is a journalist with Report for America, a service program that helps boost coverage of underreported topics and areas throughout the United States. To help LINK nky continue to provide this kind of reporting, you can make a tax-deductible donation here.
