Spanish Major
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About the Major
As a Spanish major, students can play an important role in bridging the gaps among diverse groups and their cultures while becoming proficient in a second language, a skill of value to any career. Course offerings are balanced by combining literary, cultural and linguistic study.
Jobs in Spanish
- Spanish language teacher
- English language teacher in a Spanish-speaking country
- Translator
- Foreign Service officer
- NGO Staff/Executive
Past Elon Spanish Internships
- Fundación Rehab
- Hospital Universitario Virgen del Rocío
- NCWorks Career Center - Alamance
- Alamance-Burlington School System
- Central American Lutheran Mission Society
Related Majors
Spanish studies pivotal in helping grad pioneer role with Washington Nationals
As a high school student, Andrew Scarlata excelled in Spanish — a language he picked up quickly and embraced culturally. And he loved baseball — coaching and umpiring in the local Little League program where he played as a young boy.
But he never dreamed he could make a career out of both. That changed in 2015 when he stepped onto the Elon University campus for the first time during a campus tour.
During that college visit, he fell in love with the campus — “visually, obviously, anyone would” — but was also attracted to Elon’s study abroad program, particularly when he discovered that he could spend his three-week winter term in the Dominican Republic learning about the industry of baseball and its effect on the culture, people and economy of the Caribbean nation.
To know Spanish and be able to know and understand their culture was so important. After freshman year when I did that study abroad in the Dominican Republic, I certainly realized that this is kind of a perfect marriage between both of those majors.
“Really, the study abroad programs were a main attraction for sure,” said Scarlata, who graduated Elon in December 2018 with a double major in Spanish and sport management and a minor in Latin American studies.
He would go on to study overseas three times while at Elon, and that first experience in the Dominican Republic would be life-changing.
“We visited some MLB academies there, and I remember wanting to learn more,” said Scarlata, referring to the professional baseball academies for international players. “So I spent the following summer with the Kansas City Royals as a summer intern in the Dominican Republic. That was followed by three more internships in baseball. I don’t think I would have had these opportunities anywhere else.”
During the Kansas City Royals internship, Scarlata worked with education and cultural development, helping the Spanish-speaking players learn conversational English and giving them a briefing on what to expect when they got to the United States—do’s and don’ts that would help ease their transition culturally.
His experiences in the Dominican Republic showed him how he could merge his two passions into a fulfilling career.
“To know Spanish and be able to know and understand their culture was so important,” he said. “After freshman year when I did that study abroad in the Dominican Republic, I certainly realized that this is kind of a perfect marriage between both of those majors.”
After graduating Elon, Scarlata secured an internship with the Washington Nationals, and while his job was in player development, his base in Florida had him interacting with many young international players, and he immediately saw a need and an opportunity to perform the same services he had done with the Royals.
Unlike some other Major League Baseball organizations, the Nats didn’t have a position for education and cultural development at the time. So in addition to his other intern responsibilities, he started holding classes and workshops with players, mentoring them, teaching them English one-on-one and in groups, and empowering them with cultural knowledge so they could avoid the pitfalls some new players fall into. And he documented everything he did.
“It was more just me knowing the role, seeing all the players who just flew in from the Dominican academy, and they’re only 17, 18, 19 years old, and when they get here, not knowing much English, there is a lot of culture shock,” he said. “A lot of it was natural in me, just showing them the way of things and helping them out with all the knowledge that we take for granted growing up here. There was definitely a need for it.”
At the end of his internship, he handed his documentation to the director of player development and made a pitch for why the job was needed. The team agreed, and he was hired on full-time as the Nationals’ first coordinator for player education and cultural development.
“The Spanish major played an integral part of me knowing what I needed to know culturally and linguistically to be able to do that,” he said. “That was certainly a big factor in helping me get that full-time job.”
Scarlata credits not only Elon’s language skills classes that, with their repetition and exercises and practice, gave him the confidence to teach, but also the cultural lessons, which he learned inside the classroom as well as outside during one-on-one chats with his professors.
“Getting into those deep conversations and discussions around different countries, their conflicts, their history, their day-to-day norms, it just helped me be so much better at my job than if I were to not have that,” he said, noting that Elon’s focus on experiential learning — through study abroad and internship opportunities — allowed him to relate to and understand the ballplayers at a level that is necessary to develop and mentor them.
The work he has done with the Washington Nationals continues to grow, and in 2022, his title changed — to coordinator of minor league operations and player education — reflecting his increased responsibilities, including keeping track of and filing visa applications for all the international players and staff, about 130 people in total.
But he still remains dedicated to the piece of the program nearest to his heart — helping international players adjust to life in the United States.
The program has grown since he took on the full-time role. While in the beginning Scarlata focused on giving players the knowledge they needed in their native language and teaching them some English, it wasn’t long into his new role that he implemented a high school program where players can finish high school.
Scarlata credits the experiences he was given as an Elon student with his success on the job, and he encourages students considering a major in Spanish to make use of every aspect of it.
“The classroom will provide you with a great foundation for the cultural knowledge and information, but the real learning happens when you’re in the field in those countries, talking to natives, building relationships with them, sharing a meal with them,” he said.
When Scarlata was in high school excelling in Spanish, he knew having the language skill would be important and help him in his career. But he had no idea the possibilities that awaited him.
“I certainly grew to realize I’d use it in the (baseball) industry because of the heavy presence of international players who are pretty much all from Latin America and who I’m able to communicate with fully now,” he said. “It’s an integral part of me being able to do my job.”
Did You Know?
- Spanish speakers are among the fastest-growing segments of the U.S. population. At the same time, Latin American countries and other Spanish-speaking nations make up a vital part of the global economic and political landscape.
- Professors emphasize practical use of the language, and they help students develop proficiency in six areas: listening, speaking, reading, writing, critical thinking, and intercultural competency. Course offerings develop literary, cultural and linguistic analysis skills. All classes, including beginning-level courses, are taught in Spanish.
- Spanish majors are required to study abroad for at least one semester. There also are semester and year-long study abroad programs in Argentina, Chile, Ecuador and Spain, where students live with host families and are fully immersed in the language.