Amid threats to pull state funding for how Scottsdale Unified teaches English language learning students, district officials say they have been operating within in the law and what’s best for children.
Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne is threatening to take state funding away from school districts that teach students learning the English language in anything but English.
The Arizona Department of Education says in school year 2021-22, there were a total of 1,029 English language learning students participating in a 50-50 dual language immersion program in 26 distinct local education agencies in Arizona. Dual immersion programs teach students a foreign language for a portion of the school day, and English for a portion of the school day.
Representatives at the Scottsdale Unified School District say they have less than 20 students, out of about 22,000, who this might apply to. The district says they are looking into the situation, but some feel the situation does not effect SUSD.
Horne said in a written statement, “Proposition 203, the voter protected initiative passed in 2000, specified that classes for English Language Learners must be taught in English: ‘all children in Arizona public schools shall be taught English by being taught in English and all children shall be placed in English language classrooms,’ Dual language classes, typically taught for half of each day in Spanish, are an obvious violation of this initiative. A reduction in structured English immersion from four hours to two is okay, but the rest of the day must be spent in regular classrooms with the English-speaking students, not in classes taught in Spanish.”
He also cited a memorandum from the Arizona Legislative Council that concludes: “If the 50-50 dual language immersion model allows students to be taught subject matter in a language other than English as part of structured English immersion, the model likely violates Proposition 203.”
The district has 15 English language students in dual immersion programs, rather than full English language classes, according to Horne’s count.
District spokeswoman Kristine Harrington said in a written statement that the district will review its practices.
“We have operated believing that we are doing so correctly, within the law and in the best interest of children using state recommended models of instruction,” she wrote. “We will confirm our approach and program’s compliance and welcome any opportunity to improve opportunity and outcomes for students.
“In January 2022, we created an English Language Development Task Force comprised of 21 members, including parents, community members, principals, teachers, academic coaches, special education, teaching and learning, and state and federal programs, who were chosen to represent grade levels from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade, across all five SUSD Learning Communities. The (English Language Development) Task Force goal was to develop an action plan for (school year) 2022-2023 to grow academic achievement for English Learners.”
District governing board president Julie Cieniawski is confident the situation will not effect Scottsdale Unified School District.
“According to the information I have received, roughly 16-17 (English language) students at Pueblo (Elementary) who would be impacted by this change, but there is a waiver provision (actually three waiver options) and we believe most of our current students will be covered under option one or two and so there may be zero impact except we need to get parent sign-off,” Cieniawski said in an email to the Daily Independent.
J. Graber can be reached at jgraber@iniusa.org. We invite our readers to submit their civil comments pro or con on this issue. Email AZOpinions@iniusa.org.
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