ELL challenges not insurmountable

Mayor Karl Dean was a recent visitor to Glenview Elementary, where nearly 80 percent of the students there do not speak English as their first language. Matthew Williams/The City Paper

Davidson County is home to more than a quarter of all Tennessee’s English language learners — a situation that poses challenges to Metro Schools in terms of funding.

School district leaders say there are questions as to whether the state’s funding formula for ELL students provides appropriate compensation for the resource-intense process of helping kids learn English. And school leaders say there are certain state rules that make it tough to ensure that ELL students are sufficiently proficient in time for the tests.

But high percentages of ELL students do not automatically sentence the district to trouble with No Child Left Behind (NCLB).

Claudia Russell is principal at Glenview Elementary, where 80 percent of the students don’t speak English as their first language. The school is considered by NCLB to be in “Target” status, but has made NCLB “Safe Harbor” status based on the pace of student improvement.

“We’re making Safe Harbor because we’re making gains,” Russell said. “It just takes money and it takes time. And that’s what we have to have.”

At Glenview, there are teachers in addition to those assigned to the classrooms who work with students. “Explicit, intentional” instruction, in addition to “dedicated and enthusiastic” teachers, help the school succeed, Russell said. And learning for students must be made concrete and visual, rather than abstract.

LaWanna Shelton, executive director of ELL for MNPS, said the district has no elementary schools with high concentrations of ELL students considered high-priority by NCLB. As kids get older, there are more troubles with NCLB at schools with high ELL populations, but that general trend also holds true for district performance with other student subgroups monitored by NCLB.

Elementary schools have an edge over schools with older students, Shelton said, because NCLB results are based on Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP) scores — and kids at elementary schools take the TCAP starting in the third grade, giving schools extra time to work with them.

Problems at high schools have arisen when ELL kids are scheduled for language arts classes above their English proficiency levels. If a student comes to the United States with an outstanding transcript of advanced math and science courses, that record may put the student in, for example, a 10th-grade language arts class. But that gives the student little time for preparation to score as well as English-speaking peers on writing tests.

“With the language arts piece, we’ve really shot ourselves in the foot… The policies just aren’t realistic when you don’t speak a word of English,” Shelton said. “The issue is that kids only get one year in the United States before they are expected to test, academically, the same as their peers.”

Once kids complete the district’s program for kids learning English as a second language and are considered proficient, they perform far better than their peers on standardized tests, Shelton said. Kids are typically able to complete the program after three to five years at the district.

“Those groups of kids outscore the district averages, across the board all the time,” Shelton said. “They are highly bilingual, literate kids. They outscore the district average by leaps and bounds.”

Most of the district’s approximately 7,000 ELL students opt to take part in MNPS programs for learning English as a Second Language, though some opt out “for a variety of reasons,” Shelton said.

An additional 2,000 have completed English as a second language programs, and remain in the district as proficient English speakers. The district is also home to 14,000 students from backgrounds in which English has not always been spoken at home.

While there are some public perceptions that the district’s ELL population is to blame for MNPS’s NCLB status, Shelton said the characterization isn’t fair. And as NCLB’s academic requirements continue to increase, every population of students will face challenges.

“They’re an easy scapegoat. It’s easy to blame them,” Shelton said. “The benchmarks that are set for No Child Left Behind — it’s going to catch up to everyone.”

Talk of blaming ELL students for the district’s NCLB troubles gained steam in the general public after the district entered “Restructuring I” status under NCLB. In entering “Restructuring I,” the district missed seven benchmarks for high school grades, but only one at the kindergarten through eighth grade level.

If the district had not missed a K-8 benchmark, it might not have entered “Restructuring” this year. The benchmark missed at the lower grades measured performance of English language learners.

Connie Smith, the Tennessee DOE accountability chief who has orchestrated many of the changes at Metro schools, has publicly admonished those who would single out particular groups of students in discussion of NCLB results.

Metro ELL programs unchanged

The district’s NCLB status gives the DOE control over all MNPS staff and financial resources, and over the summer, changes prompted by the state have resulted in a complete reorganization of many departments.

As part of the reorganization, the DOE hired new leaders for departments including special education and gifted education. But for Metro’s ELL programs, the state left Shelton in charge — and gave her a promotion.

Shelton currently has the title of executive director, rather than coordinator, which elevated the entire ELL office to the same level as offices for special education and gifted education.

Smith has said publicly that she considers Metro’s ELL programs to be among the best in the state and nation. No changes to the office — other than the elevation of its status — were made during the state reorganization. Shelton said she made big changes to Metro’s ELL program when she joined the staff two years ago.