Every Wednesday evening, a class is held at First Church United in West Liberty for people who are studying for the United States Citizenship test.
The students preparing for the citizenship test are Maria Mojica, Esmeralda Flores, Hector Sanchez and Carmen Aranday. The volunteers tutoring the students are Nancy Gardner and Jan Koellner.
Sanchez and Aranday are married.
“I live here in this town for almost 20 years,” Sanchez said.
Sanchez works in Iowa City at the UNFI warehouse. He has worked there for seven years, he said.
They have two daughters that are not adults but went to school in West Liberty.
“It’s unbelievable, because I remember when I had them in school,” Gardner said. “The one thing I want to say about Hector and Carmen is they started classes before the pandemic. They were really going strong and then everything shut down.”
Mojica is from Mexico. She has been in the United States for 20 years and has five children. Mojica is employed by West Liberty Foods full-time.
Flores is from Monterrey, Mexico.
“I was living before in the valley of Texas,” Flores said. “Nobody speaks English there. Everybody speaks Spanish so when I move here I was like ‘I need to speak English.’”
She moved to West Liberty a year and a half ago. She took classes at Kirkwood Community College to learn English.
“I have a goal,” Flores said. “I want to study for a career.”
Gardner asked Flores what her goal was.
“To be an American citizen,” Flores replied.
“Don’t you want to be a preschool teacher?” Gardner asked Flores.
“Oh, yes,” Flores said. “I am a preschool teacher but I started at Mexico so maybe I can work as a (preschool) teacher here.”
When the students asked what they liked about West Liberty, they all said they liked the small town atmosphere.
“I like it because everyone knows each other,” Flores said.
“Yeah, small town and it’s quiet,” Sanchez said.
Flores said she was living in a city the size of Chicago. When she moved to West Liberty she was bored at first.
“Now, I like it,” Flores said.
Gardner and Koellner started tutoring students wanting to take the citizenship exam in 2017. There were 50 students who met at the elementary school but then the pandemic hit and everything shut down.
“Nancy and I just started this small group in April,” Koellner.
One of their former students contacted them to ask if they were going to have the classes again. They decided to restart the class and quickly filled up. Seven students are participating in this class. In the fall, they hope to have another class.
Students have to be able to read several sentences in English, have to write several statements and 100 questions to study.
"The questions range anywhere from who wrote the constitution to naming one of the American Indian tribes in the United States to naming your Senators,” Gardner said.
The questions are similar to what you would learn in History and U.S. Government classes, Koellner added.
When the students take the exam, they have to answer 10 out of those 100 questions, Gardner said.
All of the students from this class have full-time jobs and families to take care of.
“And they come to study every week,” Koellner said. “We have wonderful attendance. If somebody can’t come they text us to tell us why (and) they are so motivated. It’s obvious they really appreciate the opportunity.”