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Monday, October 22, 2012

Face the Facts: Limited-English Students Test Public Schools | NewsTaco

Face the Facts: Limited-English Students Test Public Schools | NewsTaco:


Face the Facts: Limited-English Students Test Public Schools

By Raisa Camargo, Voxxi
Limited-English students are a growing part of America’s classrooms making it more diverse, but America’s teachers have some catching up to do.

Limited-English students outnumbering teachers

An estimated 10 percent of all public school students are English as a Second Language Learners (ESL), meaning they have limited English proficiency. But less than one percent of public school teachers are ESL instructors, according to the George Washington University Face the Facts initiative.
That means there’s just one ESL instructor for every 150 ESL students. The standard classroom ratio across America is one teacher for every 15 students. That’s ten times the national average of the public school classroom student to teacher ratio.
The number of ESL students is projected to increase