Use of Bilingual Materials in the Social Service System

Abstract

Research was conducted to determine the proportion of social service programs in a southern New Mexico county that have Spanish translations available of forms required during the contracting phase of the social service cycle. The contracting phase, which occupies an intermediate position within an agency's social service cycle, consists of formaliz ing a written contract between the individual consumer and a representative of the service agency. Questionnaires were mailed to 125 individual social service programs, and 81.6 % (102 programs) responded. Of these, 74.5% required indi viduals to fill out forms or provide information to complete forms in order to receive services, but only 17.1 % provided translated forms. Program administrators relied upon bi lingual staff to take care of translation tasks. The importance of hiring bilingual staff who are literate in Spanish is stressed, and recommendations are made for future research.