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New York City offers an example of the national trend to expand dual language bilingual education (DLBE) programs, yet only a small proportion of multilingual learners are enrolled in these programs in city schools. Our examination of new DLBE programs in three city schools builds on research about the “gentrification” of DLBE. Specifically, our findings show how school leaders opened DLBE programs to re-engineer the demographics of their student population by enrolling more White, privileged students in the name of “school turnaround”—namely, to increase enrollment and popularity in a school choice context and improve performance on accountability measures.

This article describes a case study of dual language bilingual education (DLBE) that challenges the model’s traditional mold while offering important insights into its utility for communities of le...

This chapter discusses differences between translanguaging theory and practice as espoused by CUNY-NYSIEB (City University of New York-New York State Initiative on Emergent Bilinguals) and the language education policies of the state. It shows the important role that the development of a school's Language Policy Vision Statement played in opening up spaces for teachers to leverage their students' translanguaging in instruction. These vision statements emerged through a joint process with the schools' Emergent Bilingual Leadership Teams, composed of stakeholders in the schools, and supported by the CUNY-NYSIEB team. We share how three different schools developed their language policy vision statements and the process of implementation. All schools developed different programs according to their needs, the viability of the program for their school population and teachers, and their broader vision. And, all schools moved toward incorporating children's multilingual practices and taking up a heteroglossic translanguaging stance. This chapter shows how translanguaging theory and practices can be brought together with the language education policies of states for their emergent bilinguals.

In this qualitative research study, we examine changes made in 23 New York City schools that participated in a project for which participating schools were asked to regard bilingualism as a resource in instruction and develop a multilingual linguistic landscape. Findings document efforts made by schools to change their linguistic landscape in ways that recognize students’ many languages and cultures, significant corresponding ideological shifts by school leaders from monolingual to multilingual views of language and language learning, educators’ incorporation of students’ home languages in instruction, and new formal language education policies resulting from these efforts. We document the impact of all of these changes on students and their families and suggest that research on linguistic landscape conducted in schools should consider not only the physical landscape but also its connections to pedagogy, programming, and language policies.

Bilingual education has described a process called translanguaging by which students use linguistic resources across and beyond multiple named languages to learn. Here, we examine how bilingual learners translanguage while learning computer science. These middle schoolers participated in a curricular intervention which infused computational thinking into their Spanish-English bilingual language arts class. Through a descriptive qualitative methodology, we document classroom moments supporting four claims: 1) students' translanguaging blurs linguistic, disciplinary, and modal boundaries, 2) computational literacies are intertwined with students' other literacies, 3) students' attitudes about language and the contexts around them play a role in their translanguaging, and 4) students translanguage to engage in specific CT practices.

This article explores the critical role of school leaders in language policy change, and specifically in shifting their language education policies and practices from monolingual to multilingual. We examine the process of language policy change in three schools that were involved in a project aimed at increasing the knowledge base of school leaders about bilingualism and language learning, and which required that participating schools use bilingualism as a resource in instruction and cultivate a school-wide ecology of multilingualism. The project encouraged translanguaging pedagogical strategies that engage the entire linguistic repertoire of emergent bilinguals flexibly. Our findings demonstrate that the school leaders made significant language policy changes that included structural changes in programming and pedagogy as well as ideological changes in adopting more favorable approaches towards emergent bilinguals and their languages. A significant finding to emerge is that shifts within schools ...

The invited colloquium on New Directions in Language Assessment held at the American Association for Applied Linguistics (AAAL) annual meeting in Portland, Oregon on March 22, 2014 brought together an international panel of scholars to together explore the possibilities and challenges of translanguaging and bi/multilingual approaches in assessment. Together, the presenters of this colloquium argued that allowing bi/multilinguals to demonstrate their knowledge and skills using their entire linguistic repertoire offers a promising new approach for teaching and assessment.

In recent years there has been growing awareness about a sub-group of students labeled Long-Term English Language Learners (LTELLs). Our study seeks to show how students who fall within the LTELL category see themselves through the lens of their lived experiences as (emergent) bilinguals, students, family/community members and transnational individuals. Countering discourses which frame these students as deficient, we apply the discourse of partiality framework as a lens through which to better understand how these students perceive themselves via their languages, ethnic-connectivity and academic trajectories. We argue that the discourse around the label can be understood as a racial project that serves to perpetuate white supremacy through the marginalization of the language practices of communities of color. We conclude by exploring how schools can take a broader view of this population to create positive learning opportunities that build on who they are and how they see themselves.

This symposium article, to which three authors contribute distinct parts, presents the rationale for standards-based language assessment and examines both the uses and misuses of language assessments in English-speaking countries that are engaged in standards-based education reform. Specifically, they focus on the assessment of emergent bilinguals (also referred to as English language learners or English as an additional language students). The first part lays out the intentions and challenges of standards-based language assessment for emergent bilinguals, focusing on validity concerns. The second part describes classroom-based teacher-led assessments of emergent bilinguals in England, which carry high stakes along with the national standardized tests. This contrasts with what is happening in the United States where, as the third part describes, the main focus is on high-stakes standardized testing for purposes of accountability. In addition to the challenges inherent in attempts to measure language in meaningful ways, a thread cutting across the authors' accounts is the widespread practice of high-stakes standardized testing. The U.S. and English cases show how issues of validity arise when emergent bilinguals are simply included into assessments intended for English monolinguals without appropriate differentiation, and when an assessment is used for purposes beyond what it was designed to do. As all of the authors of this symposium article contend, assessments—particularly when standardized—hold the potential to dominate standards-based education reform efforts when they are ultimately summative and attached to severe consequences.

This article reports findings from qualitative research conducted in 17 New York City schools to better understand why many school leaders – particularly principals – have recently dismantled their school's bilingual education programs, as part of a significant citywide trend during a restrictive period in US language policy. A main finding is that principals, who are called upon to determine their school's language policy, have not received any formal preparation to do so. New York, like most states, does not require any coursework on the education of emergent bilinguals for the certification of administrators. The school leaders we interviewed who had eliminated their bilingual programs hold limited understandings of bilingualism, linguistic diversity, and bilingual education. By contrast, principals who have maintained their bilingual education programs were found to be well prepared to serve emergent bilinguals and strongly believe in the benefits of bilingual education. They also advocate for bilingu...

This article offers a critical review of research about emergent bilingual students in secondary school, where the academic demands placed upon them are great, and where instruction typically remains steadfast in its monolingualism. I focus on recent scholarship about the diversity within this student population, and center on ‘students with interrupted formal education’ (SIFE, new arrivals who have no home language literacy skills or are at the beginning stages of literacy learning) and ‘long-term English language learners’ (LTELLs, primarily educated in their receiving country yet still eligible for language support services). Little has been published about these students, making this a significant area of inquiry. Moreover, both groups are characterized by poor performance and together illustrate the characteristics of secondary students at various points along an academic language and literacy continuum. While existing research provides important information to help us improve secondary schooling for emergent bilinguals, it has also perpetuated deficit views of these students by focusing solely on their perceived academic shortcomings. Grounded in a new body of research in applied linguistics that examines the students’ complex, creative, and dynamic language and literacy practices, I apply a translanguaging lens to critique the positioning of such students as deficient, with implications for research and practice.

This article focuses on 2 recent policy changes that have resulted in increased English-only instruction in US schools, with detrimental effects for emergent bilinguals (also known as English language learners): (a) statewide antibilingual education mandates in California, Arizona, and Massachusetts; and (b) the federal passage of No Child Left Behind (NCLB). The causal link between antibilingual education state policies and English-only instruction is transparent, yet NCLB likewise restricts the use of languages other than English in instruction. To support this argument, I share research recently conducted in New York City that demonstrates how the accountability requirements of NCLB have resulted in the dismantling of numerous bilingual education programs. Although restrictive language education policies have been adopted in US schools in the name of improving academic outcomes for emergent bilinguals, this article shares data highlighting how these policies have failed to deliver on their promises, an...

Immigrant youth who are designated as English language learners in American schools—whom we refer to as “emergent bilinguals”—are increasingly framed by numerical calculations. Utilizing the notion of assemblage from actor-network theory (ANT), we trace how emergent bilinguals are discursively constructed by officials, administrators, politicians, and the media through the manipulation and publication of school test scores, district data, and state reports. Drawing upon two overlapping, complementary qualitative studies conducted in New York City, we reveal the ways in which this places burdens on emergent bilinguals and their schools and narrows important discussions of bilingual education pedagogies to ones centered on numerical data.

Although educational policies for emergent bilinguals in New York City schools have historically supported the provision of bilingual education, the past decade has borne witness to a dramatic loss of bilingual education programs in city schools. This study examines the factors that determine language education policies adopted by school principals, through qualitative research in 10 city schools that have eliminated their bilingual education programs in recent years and replaced them with English-only programs. Our findings draw a causal link between the pressures of test-based accountability imposed by No Child Left Behind and the adoption of English-only policies in city schools. Testing and accountability are used as the justification for dismantling bilingual education programs and create a disincentive to serve emergent bilingual students, as schools are far more likely to be labeled low performing and risk sanctions such as closure simply for admitting and educating these students.

New York City is extraordinarily diverse, making it a fascinating context in which to research bilingual education. City schools have for generations served large numbers of immigrants and children...

This study examines a lesser-known population of students, called ‘long-term English language learners’ (LTELLs) in the USA, who now comprise one-third of all English language learners in New York City secondary schools. A major finding from our research, which explores the characteristics and educational needs of this student population, is that the students' prior schooling has been subtractive, posing significant challenges for their academic literacy acquisition. Having attended school in the USA for seven years or more, LTELLs have experienced programming that has not provided sufficient opportunities to fully develop their native language literacy skills, in spite of research which states that such opportunities are correlated with school success. LTELLs thus arrive in high school with limited academic literacy in English or their native languages, in spite of their oral bilingualism, posing difficulties for them in all subject areas. As part of a three-year research project, we conducted q...

This article highlights key issues surrounding the assessment and accountability mandates of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) for English language learners (ELLs). The policy requires high-stakes testing of ELLs in English—a language that these students, by definition, have not yet mastered. After offering background on current federal education legislation, this article shares findings from a word frequency analysis of actual statewide exams. This analysis reveals that even academic content tests are linguistically complex, using words likely unknown by an ELL, which clarifies why testing poses unique challenges for this student population. Analyses of recent ELL performance data on high-stakes tests are also provided, which document why these students and the schools serving them are disproportionately likely to be penalized in accordance with the law's requirements. The article concludes by challenging two of the more problematic assumptions at the core of NCLB mandates for ELLs.

The most recent federal education policy in the United States, titled No Child Left Behind (NCLB), was passed into law in 2001. High-stakes testing is the core of NCLB, as tests are used to hold each school, district, and state accountable for student performance, therein affording the federal government greater control over the constitutionally decentralized national system of U.S. education. Because the tests being used are administered in English, English language learners (ELLs) typically fail to meet the law's annual progress requirements, resulting in serious consequences for the students and their schools. This article reviews research about the effects of NCLB on language policies in education. Empirical studies show that the law—which is at face value merely an educational policy—is in actuality a de facto language policy. After explaining the law's assessment mandates, this article provides analyses of the wording of NCLB from a language policy perspective. It also reviews studies about the limitations of the required tests as instruments to carry out the law's demands, and about the effects of the law on instruction and the educational experiences of ELLs.

In the wake of the federal No Child Left Behind legislation, standardized tests have become increasingly high-stakes. Yet English language learners (ELLs) typically score far below native English speakers, creating pressure to “teach to the test.” This article shares findings from an intensive year long study in 10 New York City high schools, detailing how high-stakes tests become defacto language policy in schools. Most schools and individual educators have increased the amount of English instruction ELLs receive; however, some have instead increased native language instruction as a test preparation strategy. Curriculum and instruction focuses on test content and strategies, and English as a second language classes have become more like English language arts classes for native English speakers. In bilingual classes, tests are found to promote monolingual instruction with test translations guiding decisions about language allocation.

Latinos in the United States (US) are an important component of our national identity. Not only do people of Latino descent make up a large percentage of the US population (13%, according to the 2000 Census), but they have been a founding presence, albeit a marginalized one, in the forging of this nation’s sociocultural and sociohistorical landscape. Despite both the massive presence of US Latinos today, the role that they historically played in the expansion and development of the United States, US La-Ofelia Garcia Teachers College, Columbia UniversityKate Menken The City College of New York, CUNYtinos seem to catch national attention only as poor and uneducated Spanish speakers.

Foreword, Nancy H. Hornberger 1. Introduction, Kate Menken & Ofelia Garcia Part I: Negotiation of Language Education Policies Guided by Educators' Experiences or Identity (Individual) 2. Appropriating Language Policy on the Local Level: Working the Spaces for Bilingual Education, David Cassels Johnson and Rebecca Freeman 3. Two-Teacher Classrooms, Personalized Learning and the Inclusion Paradigm in the United Kingdom: What's in it for Learners of EAL? Angela Creese 4. "Tu Sais Bien Parler Maitresse!": Negotiating Languages other than French in the Primary Classroom in France, Christine Helot 5. "Angles Make Things Difficult": Teachers' Interpretations of Language Policy and Quechua Revitalization in Peru, Laura Alicia Valdiviezo 6. Towards Normalizing South African Classroom Life: The Ongoing Struggle to Implement Mother-Tongue Based Bilingual Education, Carole Bloch, Xolisa Guzula, and Ntombizanele Nkence 7. Enacting Language Policy through the Facilitator Model in a Monolingual Policy Context in the United States, Bonnie English and Manka M. Varghese 8. Between Intended and Enacted Curricula: Three Teachers and a Mandated Curricular Reform in Mainland China, Yuefeng Zhang and Guangwei Hu Part II: Educators' Negotiation of Language Education Policies Influenced by Situation/Context/Community (Social) 9. Maori Language Policy and Practice in New Zealand Schools: Community Challenges and Community Solutions, Mere Berryman, Ted Glynn, Paul Woller, and Mate Reweti 10. (Re)Constructing Language Policy in a Shi'i School in Lebanon, Zeena Zakharia 11. Cases of Language Policy Resistance in Israel's Centralized Educational System, Elana Shohamy 12. Traversing the Linguistic Quicksand in Ethiopia, Michael Daniel Ambatchew 13. Language Policy in Education and Classroom Practices in India: Is the Teacher a Cog in the Policy Wheel? Ajit K. Mohanty, Minati Panda, and Rashim Pal 14. Chilean Literacy Education Policies and Classroom Implementation, Viviana Galdames and Rosa Gaete Part III: Moving Forward 15. Stirring the Onion: Educators and the Dynamics of Language Education Policies (Looking Ahead), Ofelia Garcia and Kate Menken 16. Moving Forward: Ten Guiding Principles for Teachers, Ofelia Garcia and Kate Menken

Federal education legislation has had a major impact on US public schooling in recent years. In 2001, US Congress passed No Child Left Behind (NCLB)into law, generating in its wake a large number of both intended and unintended consequences. Although the law is slated for reauthorization within the next few years, it is unclear at present if it would change substantially or not and, regardless, it is likely to have lasting effects on teaching and learning for many years to come. Thus, all educators and stakeholders in public education need to be informed about how NCLB translates into classroom practice, so that they can better understand how it affects students and teachers, and so that they might play a role in informing future education policy decisions.