Empowering people in the Hispanic community is the goal of El Valor, a Chicago-based corporation, which is working with NIU to further that goal.

El Valor is interested in bringing higher education to its areas of service, the Hispanic communities of Chicago. It is based in the Pilsen community.

NIU’s Department of Leadership and Educational Policies and El Valor are currently working together on the Omega project, which delivers advanced degrees to students in LEPS.

“We’ve got to expand dramatically the concept you’ve established,” said Executive Director Vincent Allocco at an opening meeting for a July 10 seminar with NIU officials.

El Valor now is interested in establishing an Executive MBA program, Early Childhood Special Education Certification and Library Science Certification with NIU.

The seminar served to bring NIU and El Valor officials together to see where NIU is now and what it can offer in the future, said L. Glenn Smith, LEPS chairman.

“We’re committed to increasing the ethnic diversity of the student body and faculty,” said Jerrold Zar, dean of the Graduate School. “We’re here to provide access to our graduate programs,” he said.

“NIU produces good teachers,” said Fadwa Hasan, a recruiter of human resources for the Chicago Board of Education. “And there is a bilingual and special education teacher shortage. We want to place your graduates in our schools,” Hasan said.

El Valor is specifically aimed at developmentally disabled children and adults in the Hispanic communities of Chicago, including smoothing the transition into the American society of Spanish-speaking professionals who have immigrated from other countries.