{"id":1031,"date":"2022-09-17T12:25:07","date_gmt":"2022-09-17T17:25:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/?p=1031"},"modified":"2022-09-20T09:47:05","modified_gmt":"2022-09-20T14:47:05","slug":"dl-means-and-goals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/dl-means-and-goals\/","title":{"rendered":"DL: means and goals"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The long predicted<\/a> Fall campaign by the Urbana School District 116 to sell the decision they made, to merge all Dual Language classes in one school (codeword: “whole school model”) started. The crew of administrators responsible for the program (Directors Ricconi and Wiemelt) are working the parents, as usual, by triangulation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are several intrinsic tensions at play: one is between the lofty primary goal of the DL program – to give better education to the kids of immigrants, – and the gentrified version of it, – DL as a free enrichment program. There is also the split between the parents of English speakers with kids in ML (monolingual) and DL programs: some of these families will inevitably lose their neighborhood school under the administration’s plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The administration also relies on the isolation of the immigrant families, who are being told, on the background (by the various liasions<\/a><\/em>), that for them, the DL is the only way to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But above all, the administration counts on its ability to guilt-force the Board into acceptance of whichever they propose. They believe the message “Yeah, someone will have to suffer, but this is necessary to advance the fortunes of the English Learners,”<\/em> will seal the deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This message, however, is simply not true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First, let us state the obvious: yes, the schools with large population of kids without working knowledge of English have to help them (to transition them from English Learners<\/em> to English Speakers<\/em>, in school bureaucratese). This is, thankfully, the law, and the USD116 has<\/em> to make sure that English Learners learn, you know, English.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the law nowhere states that this should be done by an immersion programs. The old good ESL is a good, old tool that worked in the past and is working now, for many immigrant kids in Urbana (and elsewhere). A lot of families in our district still ask for it, and are doing just fine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps, the DL programs are working much, much better for English Learners? Somewhere, – maybe. But here? as we wrote earlier<\/a>, the numbers we were able to obtain about the situation in the USD116 simply do not support (well, do contradict) that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To resolve this contradiction, the district at some point tacitly moved the goal. Now the talking point (readily seconded by some Board members) is that the DL program aims to create a safe environment for the English Learners, helping them to preserve their culture. The important part, they repeat over and over, is that the kids still are able to talk to their folks back home in the language of their parents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Retaining their cultural, ethnic and linguistic identities is a hugely important challenge for all immigrants (I confirm that as one). Schools should cherish and support that. But it cannot be the goal<\/em> of the programs designed to help immigrant kids to be successful in this society. And it was<\/em> not how the immersion idea was sold to the district! Here’s the Board President, Paul Poulosky describing the goals of the DL program proposed by Dr. Wiemelt:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The multicultural director for the district, Joe Wiemelt, is very data driven in his methodology, and I am sure will do what it takes to make the DLL program a success.  The first priority needs to be the educational attainment of the children who are a part of the program.  Period.  <…>  I would trust the experts and the research to get this right. <\/em><\/p>excerpt from a 2012 email by Paul Poulosky.<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Isn’t it amazing to see Dr. Wiemelt characterized as data driven<\/em>? Something has happened over these long years, – and no, I do not believe that’s the impact of the “Critical Bilingual Leadership theory” Dr. Wiemelt claims to develop in his 2014 thesis. Plain institutional corruption and intellectual dishonesty are much more plausible.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The picture is pretty clear. The district started an experiment, whose success on its primary metric, educational attainment<\/em>, they are unable to confirm after a decade of trying. The growth of the attendant bureaucratic apparatus meanwhile multiplied the costs of the program and the incentives to keep it. Now these costs are about to spill over to nonparticipating, monolingual kids and their parents and, by extension, to all of us, making Urbana a much less desirable place to live for young families. To justify that pain, the district is attempting to substitute the original goal by a much fuzzier one, in hope to transplant the battle to the garbage pits of culture wars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

What we, the citizens of Urbana, can and must do in this situation is also quite clear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First, we should request the evaluation of the DL program on the terms it was started: on how it educates our kids, – first, English Learners, but also the participating English Speakers. If the district is unwilling to produce the data, the default assumption should be that the program failed its original mission<\/em>. Any new goals, like cultural support, should be deemed a backdated rationale for feeding the ever-growing body of district bureaucrats. If the District does believe in the virtues of its DL program for educational advancement of the children, it should immediately initiate a broad data gathering and analysis effort, to create an unambiguous picture of what it is achieving and at what cost. The district should not attempt any radical reorganization before such a study is done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is no pressing imperative to reorganize the DL program. If its expansion is constrained by the DL teacher shortage, the expansion should stop, and the classes should be kept at the levels the district can support in the existing setup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The district could serve its growing population of English Learners by ramping up the well established ESL program, which can be handled by the monolingual teachers (the immigrant kids are immersed into the usual classes, but get a measure of extra support, sometimes substituting the English classes, sometimes on top of them).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are a couple of standard objections to this approach. One is that these teachers would have to be ESL certified, – true, but this is a far lower threshold to entry than to be fluent in Spanish. Another one deals with the requirement that the immigrant kids should be provided lessons in their native language, culture and history. Also true, but would require far fewer Spanish-fluent teachers per student than the two-way immersion model.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Given all these considerations, we would expect a rational Board to squarely reject the administration’s request to combine the DL programs at Leal and Dr. Williams schools as premature at best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Board however, is known for its extremely deferential attitude<\/a> towards the administration. We cannot expect it to be rational.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the Board’s decision on the merger is scheduled for December, well before a new Board is elected, the natural solution is to put the question of merging the DL programs in the district on the ballot<\/strong>. The results of the vote on April 4, 2023<\/strong> would give plenty of time to stop the process of merger, if the voters reject it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By my estimates, one would need about 1,300 signatures collected by December to ensure the question will be placed on the ballot. And we can expand its scope, by asking not only whether all elementary schools in the districts should retain monolingual classes<\/em>, but putting forward other proposals. (E.g. why not to request that all elementary schools in the district provide Spanish language classes<\/em>?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This way, – by voting, – one can break the spell the administration of the district seems to have over the Board. We still live in a democracy, right?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The long predicted Fall campaign by the Urbana School District 116 to sell the decision they made, to merge all Dual Language classes in one school (codeword: “whole school model”) started. The crew of administrators responsible for the program (Directors Ricconi and Wiemelt) are working the parents, as usual, by triangulation. There are several intrinsic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[25,9],"tags":[26,22,12],"class_list":["post-1031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dual-language-program","category-school-wars","tag-dual-language-program","tag-usd116","tag-usd116-board"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1031"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1064,"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1031\/revisions\/1064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sabbe.org\/ymb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}