Community objects to San Diego schools' new approach for immigrant students
San Diego Unified School District has changed its program for immigrant middle school and high school students who don’t speak English in a way that the district says empowers the students but critics say sets them up to fail.
For almost a decade, such students — many of them refugees — spent their first year in a classroom with others like them in what the district called New Arrival Centers.
The students stayed with the same teacher most of the day, learning English and core subjects and joining other students for less academic classes such as physical education or art.
Starting this school year, the students are learning math, science and other core subjects in classrooms with native English-speaking students. A language “coach” accompanies the students to these classes to support them as well as their teachers.
The new program’s purpose is to recognize the value of the knowledge that the students arrive with, even if they cannot yet convey that knowledge in English, according to Sandra Cephas, the director of the district’s office of language acquisition.
The district was worried about isolation from the rest of the school, Cephas said.
“We don’t believe that just because they have a gap in language that they aren’t able to accomplish great things, because they can,” Cephas said. “That belief in them has to be coupled with the right support at the right time."
Cephas said the new program will accelerate the students’ language acquisition and provide equal access to the curriculum..
“The goal is for the entire school to embrace these students,” Cephas said.
She said the changes have not affected the school’s budget.
Teachers, parents and students have all expressed concern over the changes, especially for newly arrived students who had pauses in their education because they come from war-torn countries or refugee camps. Some have never been to school before and are not literate in their native languages.
Kris Larsen, who taught for the New Arrival Center at San Diego High School before retiring at the end of this past school year, said the teachers were not convinced that the changes were based on sound research.
“I get that they want to raise graduation rates,” Larsen said. “It’s absolutely absurd to think pulling these supports will raise graduation rates.”
Class size
The New Arrival Centers enabled the district to “significantly lower class size” for new arrivals and other English learners, according to Debra Dougherty, who worked in the office of language acquisition when the New Arrival Centers were created and also retired this past school year. She said it was one of the reasons the school was able to receive federal funding earmarked for immigrants and English learners.
This year, many of the classes that these students attend — now called “International Centers” — are at or near capacity. The effects of any crowding are somewhat eased because of language “coaches” added under the new Community objects to San Diego schools' new approach for immigrant students - The San Diego Union-Tribune:
