ELL News Headlines

You no doubt have heard and read your share of graduation speeches, but you probably haven’t read or heard one like this. This extraordinary speech was delivered a few weeks ago by Coral Ortiz, an 18-year-old who just received her diploma from James Hillhouse High School in New Haven, Conn.  Ortiz was a student representative on the New Haven Board of Education and the State Board of Education and is headed to Yale University, where she plans to major in political science and follow her interest in the social sciences. In her speech, she delivers a powerful message: "So to those that believed my classmates and I were incapable, I have decided to leave a message for you: To the teacher who said my classmates and I would fail and that the taxpayers wasted resources on our education — today, we teach you that you were wrong."

Social activist Innosanto Nagara wanted to find a fun book to read to his 2-year-old son that also talked about the importance of social justice. He wasn't looking for the typical fiction written for children, instead, he was looking for unique narratives — by writers of color and/or authors who can speak about social issues through their own experiences. Nagara couldn't find any. So he wrote one. But not all parents have the time to do what Innosanto Nagara did. For those who can't, NPR has compiled a list — with help from Teaching for Change — of books that frame big issues through a lens children can understand.

What role does music play in our national dialogue about immigration? Six young musicians, rooted in six different countries, gathered at Ellis Island, and in Manhattan, to explore that question in a new composition inspired by Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land."

About 30 students attending a Purdue Polytechnic Institute robotics camp first turned their workshop into LEGO Land for a week and then received a visit from Billy, a robot made out of LEGOs and mechanical sensors. Lauro Ojeda, a research scientist at the University of Michigan, led a demonstration at the camp Friday featuring Billy, which he had programmed to complete a task that all kids are familiar with — drawing.  The annual robotics camp allows students, ages 8 to 14, to be immersed in the world of robotics for three hours a day during a week-long camp, said camp director Joe Fuehne, who also is director of the Purdue Polytechnic Institute in Columbus. But this year, Fuehne and his team changed the strategy behind one of the camps. For the first time since establishing it 12 years ago, Fuehne partnered with IT Robotics, which recently opened in North Vernon, to offer a free camp specifically for Latino students.

For Dorchester parent Roberto Cardoso, the pressure to find a summer camp for Lianna, his 8-year-old daughter and only child, never goes away. He"s already worried about what she"ll be doing in the summer of 2018. This summer, though, they lucked out. Lianna, an incoming fourth-grader at the Roger Clap School, is attending a free, five-week summer program at the Hale Reservation in Westwood, a place her father had always wanted to send her to but was too costly for them. This year, she is one of 2,200 Boston Public School students who were selected for the "5th Quarter of Learning," a new component of the city's larger summer learning project that combines academics and outdoor recreational activities.

Learning and laughter filled the trailer classrooms at Knollwood Elementary School last month as English as a Second Language students from across Rowan County participated in a summer camp. Sixty-four rising first-, second- and third-grade ESL students came to Knollwood to experience a summer-camp atmosphere while expanding and reinforcing the English skills they had gained throughout the school year.Sixty-four rising first-, second- and third-grade ESL students came to Knollwood to experience a summer-camp atmosphere while expanding and reinforcing the English skills they had gained throughout the school year.

Abigail Pineda, a future Kaiser High School student, was one of 145 regional students who attended a week-long camp as part of the Inland Empire Future Leaders Program at Idyllwild Pines Camp. Although the program is currently available for every student in the region, Angelica Pineda, the mother of Abby, said many parents don't know about it, thus preventing their kids from taking part in a successful program. It was founded in 1985 to motivate Latino students to finish high school and attend college, said Dr. Tom Rivera, one of the founders.

All summer, when his students in Northern Virginia are supposed to be enjoying time away from the classroom, Principal Clint Mitchell worries about whether the children who rely on free lunches during the school year are getting enough to eat. This week, the county school system launched an expanded effort to address that need through an old-fashioned method: community barbecues. All children, regardless of whether they are eligible for free meals during the school year, eat free, while adults pay $2. The lunches will be served every weekday until Aug. 26, except for Monday and the following day, the Fourth of July.

After she realized there weren't enough girl superheroes in the world, Cynthia Leonor Garza created one. She talks with NPR's Lulu Garcia-Navarro about her new book, Lucia the Luchadora.

The public television series "POV" opened its 30th season this week with an education-themed documentary that could not be more timely. The first show airing is "Dalya's Other Country," a 75-minute film about a schoolgirl and her family who fled the violence of Syria in 2012 and settled in Los Angeles.