Enlightening English Language Learners - Essay Example

 It remains an unfortunate fact that a country of immigrants is not able to find a way to educate English Language Learners effectively. We are faced with the same challenge year after year; that is, how to educate newcomers from places in which English is not the first language? Despite the consistent, albeit futile, efforts of educational systems, especially in urban setting, we are unable to provide high quality of education to an increasing number of English Learners in our classrooms. We are mistaken when we assume that what works well for the majority of students will work with the English Language Learners. How long will it take us to realize the fact that we must to do something fundamentally different to expect positive results? Various data analyses suggest that English Language Learners are the lowest performing group among all subgroups identified (Genesee). The reasons for this miserable failure are aplenty. To name a few, lack of resources, parental involvement, high quality faculty, adequate educational facilities in colleges and institutions, political representation and the absence of attempts to prepare and develop educational leaders have been cited as the most common causes of failure (Genesee). Lack of resources is a constant challenge cited especially in the midst of budget cuts and the current financial recession we are recovering from. In practice, English Language Learners need additional funding in order to make it possible to provide a numerous facilities to ensure students are successful in learning the English Language. To this end, it has been observed that additional funding has been allocated. The funding formula is complex and is based on composite calculations. Simplistically, every English Language Learner receives, approximately, an additional allocation of $3,300 per year (Colombo and Colombo). If a district has 5.000 students identified as English Language Learners then the additional funding allocation should be about $16,000,000 (Colombo and Colombo). This funding is allocated to the district and not to the students directly; it is absorbed by the district as part of the general budget. It is apparent that districts incur, amongst other expenses, the expenses to maintain buildings, supply transportation, hire teachers and additional support personnel to provide direct and indirect services, and provide professional development. The question is how the funding, earmarked for English Language Learners, actually supports the services necessary for these students to enhance their learning of the language and its content. Some important factors seldom discussed in educational programs for English Language Learners are the lack of knowledge about how to educate them effectively, lack of teachers licensed for the teaching of ESL, lack of content that teachers prepared to educate newcomers, and the lack of understanding of how a second language is learnt (Genesee). The educators are a product of educational institutions that fail to prepare teachers to educate urban students and in particular, English Language Learners (Genesee). This becomes the root cause of ineffective current program implementation within our schools. This could be interpreted as a knowledge gap ranging from the teacher to the administrator, resulting in the inability to successfully teach the English Language Learners. Often teachers become administrators, leading to a status quo in institutions and their program implementation. This knowledge gap needs to be addressed such that it results in actionable steps to enhance the knowledge experience of the English Language Learners. Unfortunately, educational professionals are the product of the same faulty educational system and teacher preparation programs that miserably fail to execute successful implementation of programs designed provide the English Language Learners with equal educational opportunities. Currently, the Department of Education’s requirements for teacher licensure do not reflect teacher performance data (Erben, Ban and Castañeda). It seems logical that requirements to become a teacher should be aligned with the needs of districts. To this end, there is an absence of required classes on linguistics, methodologies and strategies, assessment or any other relevant course to help teachers to effectively educate English Language Learners. For instance, since education reforms in the state, in particular the inception of NCLB, it is required by the state that districts analyze the performance of various subgroups including Hispanics, SPED and African Americans and English Language Learners (Genesee). However, very few educational initiatives correlate to the performance of any of these sub groups (Genesee). We are always hopeful of fruitful results; however, we need to understand that fundamental changes need to be made and we cannot continue doing the same mistakes over and over again. Another important factor is the lack of political support to provide effective programs. A majority of new families lack the understanding of our political system and also do not have a deep understanding of their own educational rights. Furthermore, research clearly indicates that one the major factors of student success is parental involvement (Genesee). Parents truly are a cornerstone in the success of their children. Parents play a pivotal role in motivating and supporting their children to do better every day and to enable them to take advantage of every educational opportunity. However, these characteristics are not typical for the families of English Language Learners. Many of the parents of English Language Learners have the level of education to help their children in K-12 in their native language but almost none of the programs to educate these students place emphasis on native language instruction (Genesee). The reality is that these parents might lack knowledge about the language and experience of our educational systems, making them unprepared to support their children. Furthermore, the efforts of school districts to involve these parents are either inadequate or nonexistent. For most of these families, information is sent home in a language they do not understand (Genesee). Thus, we can expect parents to help their children but rarely can they help them in telling them how or what exactly to do in going about solving a particular problem. This area is greatly overlooked by school districts. Parents of the English Language Learners trust the educational institutions with the best for their kids and bestow their confidence in these institutions that they shall be able to educate them successfully. It is a fact that these students do, when compared with their former educational experiences, receive better education that what they would have received in their own countries. On the other hand, however, this “trust” bestowed upon us by the parents significantly raises our level of ethical responsibility (Colombo and Colombo). If the services and programs offered to English Language Learners were, instead, offered to students of parents who knew about the district’s responsibilities and had a better understanding of their educational rights, the quality of the program would have been a lot different than what it is at present. By the same virtue, if these parents had the ability to elect the schools’ committee members and schools’ board members and if they would have known how to lobby for political representation, then the accountability and the implementation of language acquisition programs would have been a lot better than what they are today. According to Title VI of the Civil Right Act of 1964, students must have equal access to education (Colombo and Colombo). It is therefore required that, after every audit conducted at either the federal or state level, school districts revise their language acquisition programs and services to improve the quality of education for this population of students (Colombo and Colombo). It is evident that unless the districts are cited by the state or federal government for not complying with civil rights of students, the school districts will continue their practice of not placing the education of these students as a top priority. It follows that it would be embarrassing for a school district to be cited for civil right violations when the core of every educational institution is centered on the well being of its students. Thus, to avoid the chances of civil rights violation and ensure equal educational opportunity for these students, solid leadership is required. The responsibility of facilitating this process rests largely on teachers whereas the implementation of these programs is for the most part guided by the administrators who set up the structure for these schools. However, these administrators lack the knowledge to move students from social to academic language across all levels and content areas in the school. The academic gap for these students begins almost the first day they enter our schools. Since they lack an understanding of the English Language, it follows that they also lack the understanding of the content presented by the teachers; in essence they do not have equal access to meaningful education from day one. This gap is only increased with every passing day as the issues of development of the language and content are not addressed. Many districts try innovative techniques that are just new attempts to partially improve the programs but, sadly, these only last till the next audit or till the next educational leader steps in to make things “right” for these students. At the end of the day the students suffer as almost 50% of them drop out from schools even before they complete high school which represents the greatest percentage compared to any other group (Erben, Ban and Castañeda). What is truly needed, in progressive systems, is the appointment of authentic educational leaders that understand how second language acquisition takes place. The rhetorical discussion about what the needs are is often over emphasized and acts as an impediment in taking corrective measures in tackling the issue and developing action steps to avert the problem. The educational leaders need to have full understanding of the complex issues preventing these students from learning. Leaders and teachers that have demonstrated, throughout their careers, that they have diminished the academic gap need to have a record of success with these students. Consequently, this will translate into action steps that will fundamentally change the way English Language Learners are being educated and ultimately diminish the achievement gap. The entire process of improvement requires the reallocation of sufficient resources to develop high quality educational programs; not in the form of additional funding, but in the form of “correct” and efficient utilization of what is already allocated for these students (Genesee). As part of the improvement process, teachers need to be genuinely qualified to teach these students. It must be clearly stated that having a license to teach, based on current qualifications required by the state, does not guarantee that the teacher is qualified to educate English Learners. The selection of ESL licensed teachers with proven success in classroom experience working with English language Learners is a key component (Genesee). The key is to hire the right teacher who has a full understanding of the complex issues surrounding the teaching of ESL, in which case students would have a better chance to learn the language. These teachers must have a deep understanding of language development at the beginning stage for ESL and at the same time should be able to handle and impart the content in a comprehensive way. All these skills need to be combined with the ability to maintain a rigorous learning environment in which respect and value for the students’ culture and language is perceived as an asset for the school and the community. This level of understanding and respect for these students will develop a deep sense of personal value that is an essential component in developing the self esteem and confidence of students which is critically needed to thrive in educational systems. To conclude, schools’ leaders need to create a progressive inclusive school culture to ensure that the educational performance of the lowest performing group is the defining component of the school success. Education is a two-way street: if educators teach, students should learn. The challenge is that we define our success with the learning demonstrated by the majority of students. Many believe that if more than 80% of the students are learning then teaching is effective (Genesee). However the remaining 20% that does not learn is traditionally the same group of students that is creating the historical achievement gap prevalent in the country today (Genesee). To reverse this historical trend we need to fundamentally change the way we educate these students or we will be trapped in the vicious circle preserving the current status quo. References: Colombo, Michaela and Michaela Wyman Colombo. Teaching English Language Learners: 43 Strategies for Successful K-8 classrooms. California: Sage Publications, 2011. Erben, Tony, Ruth Ban and Martha E. Castañeda. Teaching English Language Learners Through Technology . New York: Routledge, 2008. Genesee, Fred. Educating English language learners: a synthesis of research evidence. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Read More