One of the challenges for the Morgan Hill School District has
been improving the academic scores of English language learner
students. Results from this past year
’s testing released recently show a definite improvement.
One of the challenges for the Morgan Hill School District has been improving the academic scores of English language learner students. Results from this past year’s testing released recently show a definite improvement.
District Director of Curriculum and Assessment Pat Blanar said she is encouraged by the results.
“This is real testimony to the focus that we have put on working with students that are English learners, getting them ready and able to access information,” she said.
The results are from the annual CELDT, or California English Language Development Test, which measures student proficiency in three areas: listening/speaking, reading and writing. Scores are ranked in five tiers, from “beginning” to “early intermediate” to “intermediate” to “early advanced” and finally “advanced.”
A student is considered proficient if ranked in the early advanced or advanced category.
The latest results show 74 percent of the 42 ELL students in 12th grade in MHSD are proficient. Last year, 72 percent of the 75 ELL students who were seniors were tested proficient.
Throughout the district, 1,199 students are indentified as English Language Lear
ners. Districtwide enrollment is approximately 8,000.
Blanar said it is critical that students gain proficiency before high school.
“Of course, the sooner the better,” she said. “And it depends on how they come to us, whether they are somewhat fluent already, or whether there is no English whatsoever spoken in the home. Sometimes you lose kids, at the secondary level. If they can’t get the proficiency rate up, sometimes you lose them.”
Students are “reclassified” as fluent and ready for full-time instruction in English by meeting three criteria: earning a score that places them within the early advanced or advanced levels, obtaining a qualifying score on the California Standards Test taken each spring and receiving teacher approval. After the student is reclassified as fluent, they no longer take the CELDT.
“In order to reclassify them, we also have conversations with the parents,” said Blanar. “If they feel the student is not yet ready, we don’t reclassify. We certainly don’t want to release them too soon. That can be frustration and can also lead to losing kids. The big conversation is, do we hold onto them a little bit longer so we don’t get that drop off.”
This is the third year that the test was administered statewide to inform districts how well they are teaching students whose first language is not English. It is taken for the first time within 30 days of the student’s enrollment in the district and is taken annually until the student is classified fluent.
Districts are required by the state to administer the CELDT, and the testing window operates from July through October.
“It is really nice this time because you can begin to see a progression,” Blanar said. “We can look sideways and begin to look at a trend. There was movement every year; the numbers are beginning to grow at the advanced and early advanced levels … We started with a 13 percent baseline this year, and the state went up to 13 while we went up to 17. For early advanced, it was 20 percent at the state level while we were 25 percent. In intermediate, we went to 34 this year, while the county was at 32 county and the state went to 30.”
Blanar said just because the district has seen improvement does not mean efforts are not being made to raise scores more. District officials are working with ELL parents and teachers in continuing efforts to make English proficiency an attainable goal for all ELL students, she said.
“We know that we have some things we are doing well, and we will continue to expand on those,” she said. “We know that proficiency is critical to our students’ success, academically and otherwise, and we are not resting on our laurels.”
