Abstract:
In the past decade the Hispanic population increased 128 percent and the Asian 83 percent in Alexander, Burke, Caldwell, and Catawba Counties. Hispanic and Asians are drawn by a large demand for manufacturing, service, and construction jobs. Employers help these workers adjust to new surroundings by hiring bilingual individuals to work with them, providing work-site classes in the English language, and having company supervisors learn the foreign language of the workers.