Special Report: The English hurdle Special Report: The English hurdle (March 18, 2005)

Schools struggle to teach 2nd language, meet No Child burden

First of two parts This week, the state of English language education. Next week, what schools are doing to meet the challenges.
Also in this issue: Castro community speaks up, State test scores are in

By Julie O'Shea

The kids in Leslie Eichler's afternoon class at Graham Middle School know the importance of learning English.

"It will help you get a good job," one 12-year-old said.

"You'll get into college and better grades," volunteered another girl. "I want to be a doctor."

"I'm teaching my mom English," a boy added. "I give her small words to practice with."

These sixth-grade students know only too well the reality of being second language learners in America. Many of them immigrated to this country with their families at an early age, and English is not their first language. They all faced an uphill battle to stay at grade level during their elementary school years.

But for the majority of the students in Eichler's SDAIE (Specially Designed Academic Instruction in English) class, success now seems within arm's reach. All are expected to graduate to the seventh grade next fall.

"We are trying to accelerate rather than remediate," Eichler said after class on Monday. The four-year teacher explained that her SDAIE students came to her in August a grade or two behind their peers in mainstream classes. The goal, she added, is to get them caught up by June and ready to enter seventh grade.

"I would say that the biggest challenge I face is motivating these kids as a group to reach their potential," Eichler said. "You interview them, and they say that English is going to (give them opportunities), but it's like some days, they don't take the opportunities given to them."

Still Eichler says she will never give up on "her kids" -- her heart won't let her.

"I am very, very excited about being that teacher that gives them the chance to move on," she said.
The long struggle

The debate over how to help English language learners succeed has had a long and complex relationship with California's public education system.

Many of these students are new to the country, and most don't speak a word of English. Yet they are expected to participate in classroom discussions, do daily homework assignments and take standardized state exams all in English.

The law demands it.

President Bush's 2001 No Child Left Behind Act mandates that all children, regardless if they are in special education or English language learners, be at grade level proficiency by 2014. Each year, school districts must meet growth targets or face state sanctions.

Mountain View public schools have seen a steady increase of students coming onto their campuses who do not know English. Administrators say they don't know what is causing the spike, and they don't know when those numbers will go back down again.

At Mountain View-Whisman, Castro Elementary has been designated a Program Improvement school. Theuerkauf and Slater schools and high-achieving Los Altos High are on the brink of becoming Program Improvement schools because their English learner subgroup did poorly on last year's state exams. Program Improvement is a formal designation put on schools that do not meet their annual growth targets in all subgroups two years in a row. Schools must meet targets two years in a row to be taken off Program Improvement status.

"If policymakers would spend just one month in a classroom of [English Language Learners], I think we would have different expectations," said Judy Crates, Graham Middle School's principal who has spent years working on bilingual education.

"First of all, learning a second language isn't easy ... or we'd all be bilingual. It requires years of study and a lot of hard work."

Studies show that learning a second language takes five to seven years to master. However, the state and federal government aren't giving students that long. And that has school districts panicked.

"There is no silver bullet. If there was a silver bullet, someone would be marketing it," Crates said. "Talk is cheap. It's easy to say 'Just learn the language.' But it isn't easy. This is a complex issue."
The battle at Mountain View-Whisman

Over the past few months, the issue has surfaced repeatedly during Mountain View-Whisman's school closure discussions, becoming a lightening rod for critics who have long complained that the cash-strapped district isn't doing enough for their second-language learners.

The discussion heated up when school board President Ellen Wheeler suggested trustees lay off closing Slater and instead consider Castro, one of the district's lowest performing schools where more than 80 percent of the student body is English language learners.

The school district has 1,895 English language learners this year, and many are enrolled at Castro. If the Escuela Avenue campus were to close, these students would be dispersed to the remaining six elementary schools, where they will no doubt be exposed to more English language role models.

While some saw Wheeler's plan as a way to desegregate the primarily Latino campus, others said it was yet another swipe at an underrepresented population.

Karen Velasquez, who moved to Mountain View from Guatemala 11 years ago, has a young son at Castro. While she has not been overly pleased with some of Castro's leadership and the school's bleak test scores are indeed concerning to her, Velasquez said she doesn't want trustees targeting her neighborhood school simply because "they knew we weren't going to fight back in the same way Slater did."

Administrators have repeatedly lamented that Latino parents rarely seem to get involved in their children's schooling. If there was more involvement, perhaps their kids would be doing better in school, they say.

But Castro Principal Carla Tarazi said it's not as simple as that. There are a lot of reasons why these kids aren't excelling academically. "It doesn't have anything to do with being a Latino," Tarazi said.

"I think poverty is a big issue," she added. "Parents have less resources at their disposal. Those kids haven't had the experience wealthy kids might have like going to museums, movies, traveling, which all add to their learning experiences."

Velasquez said she knows she can't give all those things to her son, Josue, who learned English while attending day care. But lack of experiences isn't going to stop the 7-year-old from succeeding in life, his mother vowed.

"It's a long way before Josue gets to college, but that's my dream -- that he is going to get there," Velasquez said. "I am always telling him: 'when you go to college ...' and 'when you go to college ...' and 'when you go to college ...'"

For Velasquez, there is no other choice.
Times have changed

Educators admitted that 10 years ago, it was easier to ignore English learners' demanding needs than to pour scarce resources into trying to get them up to speed.

"Before all these tests and standards were put in place, ELL students were seen as almost 'acceptable tragedies,'" said Pat Hyland, principal of Mountain View High School. "These things have forced us to say 'Hey, wait a sec, we're going to get in trouble if we don't do anything about this.' Kids who were easy to ignore before can't be ignored anymore."

In 2002, a year after the federal government unveiled No Child Left Behind, California launched the English Language Development Test (CELDT), which tests students whose home language is not English. And 2006 marks the first year high school seniors will have to pass an exit exam in order to receive their diplomas.

Suddenly, schools found themselves having to abide by tougher accountability laws and measures. "In the past, there was no accountability measures in place. School districts were using their own (measures) to test ELL students, and (many of) those results weren't being reported to the state," said Yee Wan, coordinator of English Language Learner Programs for the Santa Clara County office of Education. Now that there are measures in place, "I think that people are seeing that the needs for English language learners aren't being met," she said.

Hyland said it's unfortunate that the state education tests are only conducted in English. She hopes for the day when children are tested for their knowledge and not their language capacity. "We are trying to use a one-size-fits-all," she said. "The system allows kids to be put in a pecking order. It's so much to deal with."

Wan doesn't think any one person's to blame. "We all have to support the effort. It takes a commitment from everyone," she said. The federal government gives the county $85 a year for every English language learner. And the state kicks in $236 per pupil. That comes out to $609,943 for Mountain View-Whisman and $63,730 for the high school district.

But is that enough to pay for all the programs and extra services needed to help these students improve on their test scores?

Wan chuckled: "I'm at the county office, so no comment."
E-mail Julie O'Shea at joshea@mv-voice.com

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