Written by Sara Hinds
This spring, Brayden Boehle will graduate from Doane University with more than a bachelor's degree in business. Tacked onto his transcript, and a likely addition to his resume, will be the Certificate in Spanish for Business.
It’s one of three certificates Doane undergraduates can earn (Spanish for Educators and Spanish for Healthcare certificates being the other two).
These 12-credit-hour certificates are geared toward students who are at a novice or intermediate level of proficiency and might not have time to earn an 18-credit-hour minor or 30-credit-hour major.
Students take three classes at the SPA 102 level or above, and one course that corresponds directly to the certificate topic. Most of the courses are already offered in Doane’s curriculum, but the bundling into certificates enhances some of the university’s most popular career pathways.
As a then-junior, Boehle was a perfect candidate for the certificate. He was working at Pinnacle Bank in Crete and was teaching himself Spanish on the side to help his coworkers and clients.
He learned about the certificate from Associate Professor Joshua Pope, Ph.D., who he worked for as a teaching assistant. Pope teaches Spanish and sees the certificates as a benefit for students from any degree program.
“Professionals in any profession can get a boost from speaking Spanish,” Pope said.
In a country with no official language, Spanish is the second-most common language (behind English) spoken in United States homes according to Statista. Globally, it’s the fourth-most common language behind English, Chinese (Mandarin) and Hindi.
With a certificate, minor or major in Spanish, Pope said students can communicate with a wider variety of people and understand more about their cultures.
Boehle will take his final class for the certificate this spring, the “Spanish for Business” course. The profession courses alternate on a three-year cycle and focus on Spanish in the context of the subject. In the “Spanish for Educators” class, Pope engaged students through activities like communicating with parents, verbally and through letters and emails.
After graduation, Boehle will work at Pinnacle Bank in Aurora, Nebraska, as a management trainee program member. He already feels more fluent, formal and grammatically correct when he speaks Spanish. He even studied abroad in Costa Rica for four weeks in summer 2025.
“It's a super cool thing to be able to say that you know another language,” Boehle said. “[It’s] cool to be able to understand and embrace another culture [and] be able to communicate with that many more people.”
