English Language Minority Students and Education Policy: A Focus on the Latinx Population

Abstract

Our federal government allows states to pass and ratify new laws every year. Over the last thirty years, America has experienced a polarized fight over the expansion or reduction of government involvement. In terms of education policy, local districts and governments can play an essential role in the implementation, evaluation, and development of equitable educational opportunities. This paper examines federal and state level policies in the context of English Language Learners’ (EL) educational opportunities. In particular, I focus on Mt. Diablo High School, which is located in the Mount Diablo District. According to the California State Department of Education, the percentage of English Language Learners at this school is 33.5%. Out of this percentage, a majority of English Language Learner students at Mt. Diablo High School are Latinx (84.98%). These statistics help to demonstrate that state and district level policies lack inclusivity, student awareness on academic resources, accessibility to career center programs, and a lack of parent and teacher participation. Due to these shortcomings, these policies primarily feed into the undereducation and retention of EL students. By analyzing existing Student Site Council meetings and state-level data sets, I argue that there is a higher need for accountability and support relative to the number of EL students attending Mt. Diablo High School. 2 McNair Research Journal SJSU, Vol. 15 [2019], Art. 10 https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/mcnair/vol15/iss1/10 106 Introduction During 2013-2014, unaccompanied child migration from Central America to the U.S. reached its peak. According to the article, “As immigration resurges, U.S. public schools help children find their footing” published by the Washington Post in 2016, the influx of immigrant children to our public schools has been a challenge—not only for these newcomers, but also for the teachers, staff, parents, and policymakers. However, as many are aware, migration is not a new topic in this country; in 1965, when The Immigration and Naturalization Act abolished some of the xenophobic quotas in previous times, the demographics of the U.S. significantly changed. Today, one in four children in the U.S. are the children of immigrants (Gandara, 2018). The United States Department of Education faces the great responsibility of educating every child in this nation. One of the programs that attempts to accommodate newcomers into public schools is the English Learner Development program. According to Laura Hill, a researcher at the Institute of Public Policy in California, the number of EL students in the California education system is around 1.3 million. Any student who enrolls in K-12 education in California and speaks a language other than English is automatically considered and classified as an English Learner student—a status that is meant to be temporary. (Hill, 2018) The current population of EL students in California public schools is large and diverse. Most EL students are born and raised in the United States; nevertheless, if we compare immigrant EL students to EL students born in the States, there is a significant difference between both groups. For example, EL students who, for different reasons, spend more time classified as EL students (more than 3 years) seem to “get stuck” in the system and are less likely to be reclassified as “fluent.” This has been an issue for many districts and state policymakers since the English Learner Development program started. Today, the student population of “ever ELs” has grown to 38 percent in all K-12 institutions in the state of California (Hill, 2018). 3 De Santos Quezada: English Language Minority Students and Education Policy: A Focus Published by SJSU ScholarWorks, 2019 107 Background and Research on undereducated Immigrant Latinx Students Pedro R. Portes and Spencer Salas (2014) have an extensive history as researchers in writing and analyzing education policy. In the book, U.S. Latinos and Education Policy, Research Based Directions for Change, Portes and Salas raise two important and relevant ideas for this research: 1) despite the multiple reforms that aim to support and increase equal opportunities for quality education for all students, most low-income children (especially from Spanish speaking families) are still undereducated and 2) the fact that “schools remain politically structured to educate and graduate most students subject to group-base inequality below grade level and to house most until they, as a whole, populate the “nation’s underclass” (p.3). The first idea supports the argument that there is a need for government funds to repair the gap of success that affects Latinx English Learner students in California. The second factor emphasizes the need for accountability and scrutiny towards these politically-structured institutions. In order to address Portes and Salas’ ideas, their research asks: why can’t the United States, especially the education system, after decades, organize a better system that effectively and systematically reduces group-based inequality in education outcomes? Using the term, “undereducation” Portes and Salas explain that this change can occur by “design[ing] a dialectical program” (p.4). This program should be developed and organized by the dominant group and its leadership, whose job is to implement, write, and advocate for policies that maintain the pipeline of undereducated Latinx students in the United States. While Portes and Salas do an excellent job dismantling, explaining, and outlining how policymakers from local to national levels might understand and apply policies for the benefit (or to the detriment) of undereducated children, they do not acknowledge the sources of income for public schools or who controls them. Rather, their intent is to call for politicians, policymakers, and the government to bypass the local level and argue for the need of “scholarship and research to translate how understandings generated therein might be realized at a macrolevel – over the sustained K-12 experiences of Latino children” (p.5). In light of Portes and Salas’ intent, this research will help to address how policymakers interpret and write policies for Latinx students. 4 McNair Research Journal SJSU, Vol. 15 [2019], Art. 10 https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/mcnair/vol15/iss1/10 108 Laura Hill (2018) explains the recent reforms made to address the English Learner Achievement Gap. According to Hill, these new reforms aim to alter how California “funds, educates, assesses and holds districts accountable for EL students” (Hill, 2018). The purpose of Hill’s article is to examine the facts on English Language Learners academic performance, the assessments and standards that these students are required to meet for their reclassification, and The Local Control Funding Formula to fund these programs. According to Hill, “40 percent of students in California speak a language other than English at home” (Hill, 2018). During the 2016-2017 academic year, more than 1.3 million students were English Learners; out of this number, 83 percent spoke Spanish. Rebecca M. Callahan and Dara Shifrer’s (2016) recent study on English Language Learners further examines the concept of undereducated minorities that Portes and Salas (2014) presented in their study of Latinx students. In their study, Callahan and Shifrer had the task of looking at English Learners’ academic exposure in secondary schools. Education policies for English Learner students are meant to fulfil the “linguistic and academic development” of students “without furthering inequity or segregation” (Callahan & Shifrer, 2016). However, despite the policies’ purpose, Callahan and Shifrer found that EL students in secondary schools are still “experiencing significantly less academic exposure” and therefore feeding into the undereducated class of Latinxs in public schools (Callahan & Shifrer, 2016). Their research looks at the courses that EL students have taken during high school as “evidence of academic equity in access and English Learner program effectiveness” (Callahan & Shifrer, 2016). The researchers detail the challenges that many English Learner students face in order to succeed and attain basic knowledge and skills to fulfill high school requirements. The following are the two main challenges that researchers found. 1) The flexibility and authority that Local Education Agencies (LEAs) have to address the needs of their specific population of English Learner students and 2) the “so-called” “Equity Trap” which, according to Callahan and Shifrer, “occurs when teachers develop a false sense of assurance that validates” English Learner students’ “low academic expectations based on their proficiency in English” (Callahan & 5 De Santos Quezada: English Language Minority Students and Education Policy: A Focus Published by SJSU ScholarWorks, 2019 109 Shifrer, 2016). In other words, due to the focus on helping English Learner students understand and speak English, when teachers see that a student is succeeding—even by a small amount—they feel that their job is done. As a result, this feeds into the undereducation of EL students by reinforcing the concept of not asking them to do too much, just what they can manage. This “pobrecito syndrome” makes an educator a sympathizer instead of an emphasizer, thereby making them expect less from EL students in comparison to their peers (Callahan & Shifrer, 2016). Historically, there are “existing racial and socioeconomic disparities in course taking and achievement” (Callahan & Shifrer, 2016) that impact EL students’ opportunities to an equal education. The results of Callahan and Shifrer’s study show a significant difference between Native English, Language Minorities, and English Learners, showing that only 11% of English Learners completed all the courses for college readiness preparation compared to 31% for Language Minorities and 38% for Native Speakers (Callahan &