ELL News Headlines

As President Donald Trump weighs the fate of undocumented youth brought to the United States as children, hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of K-12 children and the educators who serve them are bracing for upheaval. Denver schools Superintendent Tom Boasberg issued a joint statement on Thursday with officials from the Denver teachers' union, Padres & Jóvenes Unidos, a children's advocacy group, and the Colorado Education Association to denounce the moves. "Immigrant and refugee students, families, educators, and staff are precious members of our Denver school communities and we greatly value them for the contributions they make to our schools and communities. We will do everything in our individual and collective power to protect them from deportation, criminalization, intimidation and harassment," the statement read in part.

TESOL International Association, the nation's largest organization for teachers who specialize in working with English-learners, has asked President Donald Trump and his top education advisers to honor the rights of students regardless of national origin or native language.

President Donald Trump's new immigration orders are harmful and will worsen the plight of children fleeing for their lives, pediatricians said Wednesday. And they will scare the children of immigrants already living in the country, causing toxic stress, the American Academy of Pediatrics said in a strongly worded statement.

Multilingual paraprofessionals—an untapped talent pool that could help address the nation's shortage of bilingual K-12 educators—face bureaucratic, financial, and linguistic barriers that make it tough to earn teaching credentials, a new report concludes. New America released the report, "Teacher Talent Untapped: Multilingual Paraprofessionals Speak About the Barriers to Entering the Profession," roughly six months after unveiling a study that outlined how the paraprofessionals could help address the shortage.

Unlike in many parts of New York City, in Community School District 3 — which runs from 59th Street to 122nd Street along Manhattan's western flank, then takes a dogleg into Harlem — people from different races and socioeconomic levels often live near one another. The district's schools, however, are sharply divided by race and income, and diverge just as sharply in their levels of academic achievement. Nowhere is that tale of two districts clearer than in Harlem.

Following the precedent set by Evanston Township High School District 202 last week, the Evanston/Skokie School District 65 board voted unanimously on Monday to declare D65 a "safe haven school district." The D65 resolution was drafted in conjunction with the ETHS resolution and uses a lot of the same wording, emphasizing a commitment to the inclusion of all students regardless of any potential barriers to educational access, district superintendent Paul Goren said.

Spanish-speaking English-language learners in Washington state enroll in half as many advanced courses per year as other ELLs, and earn lower grades in those classes, a new Regional Education Laboratory Northwest study found.

The White House says President Donald Trump will not take immediate action on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, an Obama administration policy that grants deportation reprieves for hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer on Monday said Trump will focus on immigrants who have overstayed their visas and those with criminal records, not DACA participants. Spicer did not directly address a question on whether President Trump will sign an executive order to shut down DACA. Spicer also declined to offer details on several questions related to DACA, including whether DACA-eligible students should apply or re-apply for the status.

Congressman John Lewis made history at the 2017 American Library Association (ALA) Youth Media Awards (YMA) on Monday, January 23, when March: Book Three (Top Shelf), the third installment of his graphic autobiography, written with Andrew Aydin, took four YMA wins, including the Michael L. Printz Award. Previously, March earned the 2016 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature as well as the 2017 Walter Award.