A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Chapter 201

I. Program Profile

Purpose: To assist local education agencies (LEAs) and other eligible grantees in the development and support of instructional programs for students with limited English proficiency (LEP). By statute, Part A programs are to receive at least 60 percent of Bilingual Education Act funds.

Funding History

II. Program Information and Analysis

Population Targeting

• Students classified as LEP comprise 7 percent of the first grade cohort, about 6 percent of the third grade cohort, and about 3 percent of the seventh grade cohort.

• LEP students are disproportionately represented in schools with high concentrations of poor children. The proportion of LEP first grade-students in high poverty schools (21.6 percent) is three times the proportion found in low-poverty schools (7.2 percent). In urban communities, 30 percent of students are from minority language backgrounds, and one in seven students is classified LEP. LEP students are disproportionately represented in schools with high concentrations of poor children. In first and third grades, LEP students are about three to six times more likely to be found in high poverty schools than in low poverty schools. In first grade, the percentage of LEP stu dents in high poverty schools (22 percent) is many times the proportion in low poverty schools (2 percent).

• In the first grade, 20 percent of Chapter 1 LEP students received Chapter 1 English as a Second Language or Bilingual Education services, and about 16 percent received other Federally funded language services. In third grade, about 10 percent of LEP students were receiving Chapter 1 ESL/BE and 4 percent were identified as receiving other federally supported assistance.

• Availability of language services varies with concentration of LEP students within the school. For example, for seventh graders, 58 percent of the LEP children in low concentration schools receive language services from some source; however, where the LEP student concentration is 25 percent or higher, nearly 90 percent of LEP children receive some language services.

• LEP students are disproportionately represented among low achievers. LEP students were more than three times as likely to be low achievers than high achievers. Among students who score below the 35th percentile on nationally normed achievement tests, about 13 percent of the first and third grade cohorts and about 6 percent of the lowest achievers in the seventh grade cohort are classified as LEP. Less than 3 percent of high achieving first graders were LEP, and the proportion was lower for the third and seventh grades.

• In elementary grades, about 40 percent of the language minority children are also LEP and need language services. By the middle school grades, the proportion of LEP students among language minority students drops to about one quarter.

An estimated 349,500 students were served in projects funded under Title VII Part A in 1993 (III.2). The number of LEP students in grades K-12 in the fall 1991 was 2,314,000 according to projections from a survey of school districts. This was an increase of almost 1 million LEP students in grades K-12 from the estimate in the 1984 Descriptive Study. Approximately 6,400 of the 15,000 school districts in the country had LEP students enrolled. Among districts serving LEP students, 24 percent had nine or less LEP students, but 8 percent served a thousand or more LEP students, and 6 percent of the districts served a student population which was at least 40 percent LEP (III.3).

73 percent of LEP students speak Spanish. The next largest language groups were Vietnamese (3.9 percent), Hmong (1.8 percent), Cantonese (1.7 percent), Cambodian (1.6 percent), and Korean (1.6 percent). LEP students whose native language was a Native American language represented 2.5 percent of all LEP students in the U.S. (III.3).

Title VII Part A grants for capacity building serves approximately 15 percent of the 2.3 million students identified by States as LEP (III.3).

The choice of measures significantly affects the number of students formerly identified as limited English proficient. A study of student selection procedures found that, when a student speaks some English, different oral language proficiency tests often disagree as to whether the student should be classified as LEP. Classification of such students as LEP depends on what test is used and how high or low a local district or State chooses to set cut-off scores for selection into or exit from the program (III.12).

Services

• Transitional Bilingual Education. A program designed to provide structured English language instruction and, to the extent necessary to allow a LEP child to achieve competence in English, instruction in the native language, and incorporate the cultural heritage of the child and other children in American society. Such instruction must, to the extent necessary, be in all courses or subjects of study to allow students to meet grade promotion and graduation requirements.

• Developmental Bilingual Education. A full-time program designed to provide structured English language instruction and instruction in a non English language in order to help students achieve competence both in English and in a second language while mastering subject-matter skills. The instruction must be, to the extent necessary, in all courses or subjects of study to allow a child to meet grade promotion and graduation requirements. Where possible, classes must be composed of approximately equal numbers of students whose native language is English and LEP students whose native language is the second language of instruction.

• Special Alternative Instruction. A program designed to provide structured English-language instruction and special instructional services that will allow a LEP child to achieve competence in the English language and to meet grade promotion and graduation standards. These programs are neither transitional nor developmental but have specially designed curricula and are appropriate for the particular linguistic and instructional needs of the children enrolled. Native language instruction is neither required nor prohibited.

• Academic Excellence. A program designed to facilitate the dissemination of effective bilingual practices of transitional or developmental bilingual education or special alternative instruction projects that have an established record of providing effective, academically excellent instruction and are designed to serve as models of exemplary programs.

• Family English Literacy. A program of instruction to help LEP adults and out-of-school youth achieve competence in English; the subject matter may be taught either entirely in English or in English and the native language. To the extent feasible, preference for participation is given to parents and immediate family members of students enrolled in other programs assisted under the Bilingual Education Act.

• Special Populations. Programs of instruction for LEP students in preschool, special education, and gifted and talented programs which are designed to be preparatory or supplementary to programs such as those assisted under the Act.

Program Administration

Outcomes

Parent involvement is another key to improving education outcomes (III.13). A study of the Family English Literacy program found that both participants and project directors reported that the most important achievements were improved English proficiency, literacy, and parenting skills, and greater involvement in their children's education (III.8). There is significant demand for family English literacy. A study of 54 Family English Literacy Program projects funded from 1985 to 1989 (III.4) found the following:

• Projects found that projects dedicated 50 percent of their time to English literacy instruction. The remainder was dedicated to either native language literacy, parent education and training, parent/child activities, and pre-employment skills.

• Projects served a greater number of mothers than any other identified group; mothers were 5 times more likely to participate alone than fathers or both parents.

• About a third of the projects reported waiting lists for participants, with an average of 55 people waiting to enroll in the projects and a waiting period of four months.

• 82 percent of participants were born outside the U.S., 49 percent had lived in the U.S. 5 years or less.

An evaluation of the preschool component of the Special Populations Program (III.9) found that:

• The projects were diverse in philosophy and practice of bilingual education. Some projects provided instruction predominantly in English, some predominantly in the native language, and others placed equal emphasis on both languages.

• There was a difference in the degree to which projects were developmentally appropriate for preschool children. Those less appropriate offered predominantly teacher-directed activities and focused on cognitive and language skills. Those more appropriate allowed children to direct their own learning and progress at their own pace; these programs were concerned with the development of the "whole child," rather than only the child's intellectual/language skills.

• All projects offered services for children above and beyond classroom activities, such as parent training, family counseling, transportation, meals and snacks, health services, and social service referrals.

• In most projects, the ethnicity of the staff matched that of the children and some, if not all, of the staff spoke the language of the children.

• Students in each project were observed to gain some skill in English. Many began the year with no knowledge of English and gained rudimentary skill.

• On a scale from 1 to 5, with 1 and 2 representing "non-English speaker" and 3 "limited-English speaker," projects' average scores at the end of the year ranged from 1.8 to 3.1. However, because of the questionable validity of assessing students at this young age, interpretation of these test scores may be problematic at best.

• Kindergarten and first-grade teachers reported project participants to be ahead of children who had not attended preschool in the wide range of cognitive, social/emotional, and motor skills needed by elementary school students.

A special study of American Indian students in a sample of 11 public and tribal schools receiving Title VII funds found that the major portion of the overall instruction these students received was in English language arts: approximately 58 percent of the weekly hours received by the second graders and 47 percent of the hours received by fourth graders. About 71 percent of the second graders received special instruction in English; about 43 percent of the fourth graders received such instruction. Overall, the students received less than two hours a week in the language arts of the Indian language. These students scored substantially below the national norm on standardized achievement tests. On a nonverbal aptitude test, however, they scored at about the national norm, indicating that schools are not tapping their potential (III.7).

A study of exemplary Special Alternative Instructional Programs identified the following common themes in instructional design and practice at nine exemplary sites: alignment of the curriculum with mainstream instruction programs; effective program staffing; peer teaching; native language support; parental involvement; and use of local resources (III.8).

The 6 year study of three bilingual education instructional approaches looked at immersion, early-exit and late-exit programs for Spanish-speaking students, and found the following (III.5):

• A passive learning environment characterizes classrooms across all programs, limiting opportunities to produce and develop language. Students produce language only when directly working with a teacher and then only in response to teacher initiations. Teacher questions are typically low-level requests for simple information recall.

• Bilingual teachers vary across the three approaches with respect to their language proficiency and bilingual training. Late-exit teachers are more proficient in the students' native language and have advanced bilingual training. By contrast, immersion and early-exit teachers are not sufficiently proficient in the native language to teach it, and do not have as much advanced training.

• While the majority of parents in all three approaches report that they read to their children in Spanish or English, more late-exit and early-exit parents than immersion-strategy parents help with or monitor their children's homework, suggesting a relationship between the use of the native language in instruction, parental involvement in homework and student achievement.

• It typically takes 5 to 7 years to develop the full English language proficiency required for high performance in academic settings. Contrary to common expectations, the amount of time LEP students remain in immersion strategy, early-exit, and late-exit programs is about the same. Both immersion and early-exit programs call for mainstreaming within 2 or 3 years. However, this study found that, in practice, over two-thirds of the students in the immersion strategy and over three-fourths of the early-exit students are not mainstreamed after 4 years in their respective programs.

• After 4 years in their respective programs, immersion and early-exit students demonstrated comparable skills in mathematics, language and reading when tested in English.

• Among the three late-exit sites, students in the two sites that used the most Spanish posted higher growth in mathematics skills than the site which abruptly shifted into almost all-English instruction.

• Students in all three bilingual education programs realized growth in English language and reading skills that was as fast or faster than the norming population. A higher percentage of late-exit students (about one-third) are reclassified from LEP to fully English proficient (FEP) than are students in either immersion strategy (22 percent) or early-exit (19 percent) programs.

In October of 1990, the Department of Education requested the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) to review two major, multi-year evaluation studies of bilingual education, the National Longitudinal Study of the Effectiveness of Instruction of LEP Students, and the Longitudinal Study of Structured English Immersion Strategy, Early-Exit and Late-Exit Transitional Bilingual Education Programs for Language-Minority Children. The NAS was asked to review the methodology employed by each study, to assess whether additional analyses of the data would be productive, and to provide the Department with advice on conducting such studies in the future (III.6). The panel found the following:

• Because of the poor articulation of study goals and the lack of fit between the discernible goals and the research design, it is unlikely that additional statistical analyses of these data will yield results central to the policy questions to which these studies were originally addressed. Both the studies suffered from excessive attention to the use of elaborate statistical methods intended to overcome the shortcomings in the research designs. The absence of clear findings in the studies that distinguish among the effects of treatments and programs relating to bilingual education does not warrant conclusions based simply on these two studies regarding differences in program effects.

• The National Longitudinal Study found evidence that positive outcomes of "late-exit" bilingual programs, which provided at least 40 percent of instruction in native language through grade 6, grew "faster than the norming population" (p. 39). The NAS determined that because of the study's inability to control for school-district variables, statistical comparisons were invalid between late-exit programs on the one hand and early-exit or structured immersion programs on the other. Nevertheless, the NAS concluded that the report's findings regarding ative-language development were "consistent with empirical results from other studies and support[ive of] the theory underlying ... bilingual education."

• The main recommendation of the NAS for future efforts to evaluate programs of instruction is to avoid overly ambitious large-scale studies implemented in broad national populations, and to concentrate instead on smaller-scale comparative studies of different programs as they apply to different communities. The NAS recommended carefully specified designs in which the federal government defines treatments and tests these treatments through randomized assignment.

In its review of research on educating LEP students, the Stanford Working Group notes that researchers have reported increasingly favorable outcomes in programs that stress native-language development. For example, a 6 year project of the California Department of Education, entitled "Case Studies in Bilingual Education", reports favorable outcomes from programs (III.15). The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Centre for Educational Research and Innovation, examines such programs in industrialized nations, Education and Cultural and Linguistic Pluralism: Synthesis of Case Studies--Effective Strategies and Approaches in the Schools (III.16).

Dissemination of best practice is a key to improving the effectiveness of programs serving LEP students. A study of The Title VII Academic Excellence Program: Disseminating Effective Programs and Practices in Bilingual Education (III.11) conducted file reviews and telephone interviews of 9 original grantees that had been selected to disseminate quality bilingual programs, and 147 adoption sites/schools. The study found the following:

• Program practices of the original 9 sites in 7 states have been disseminated to an estimated 147 sites in 16 states. The number of adoptions ranged from 6 to 34 per original site. 46 percent of the sites reported the adopted program had been integrated into the regular program and 47 percent reported that it had been adopted as a supplement to the regular program. In 60 percent of the adoptions, substantive modifications in the original program had been made.

• While sites share generic stages of dissemination and replication (materials development, outreach/awareness, adoption decisionmaking, adoption site personnel training, assistance with implementation, monitoring, and evaluation), there is great variation across the sites in the actual activities.

• One-third of the sites have no data on the effects of the adopted programs on student achievement. Only 14 percent of adoption sites compared student achievement data to that collected by original sites. States varied widely in their exemplary program validation process, with California being the most comprehensive. Texas and Arizona had validation processes developed in response to the Federal Title VII program. Florida, Pennsylvania, and Puerto Rico had no set criteria for validation of exemplary bilingual programs.

• Adoption sites report that the program had positive impacts on teachers' ability to meet student needs (54 percent), on student achievement (70 percent), oral language proficiency (63 percent), written language fluency (62 percent), and student self-esteem (60 percent).

Program evaluation can be a key element in continuous program improvement. A study of the Title VII evaluation systems titled Serving Different Masters: Title VII Evaluation Practice and Policy found that the purposes and audiences of Title VII evaluations have not been clearly articulated by the U.S. Department of Education, their linkage to local Title VII projects and evaluation priorities have not been clear (III.17).

• The study finds confusion over the role of the Office of Bilingual Education and Minority Languages Affairs (OBEMLA) and Grants and Contracts Service in monitoring receipt of evaluation reports, and the timing of evaluations and report deadlines have not allowed their use in the grant renewal application process.

• Title VII evaluation reports were rarely, if ever used in assessing Title VII at either the project or program level. The poor quality of the data collected by many projects hinders evaluations and their use. Due to limited funding, evaluations typically focus on outcomes, providing little information on how to improve the implementation process.

• The study found that given the amount of funds being spent on the average Title VII evaluation, the requirements for evaluation reports in present Title VII regulations are unrealistic. In general the quality of Title VII evaluation reports was described as poor to adequate.

• The Evaluation Assistance Centers were found to provide useful services to many Title VII projects and to have contributed to improved research designs of Title VII projects, but to help further improve project evaluations, the breadth of EAC services could be broader and their mandate could be broadened to include review of evaluation reports. The Bilingual Education Evaluation System (BEES) was found to be useful for evaluators but too technical for project directors.

• Generally evaluation research designs were found to have improved from those conducted in the early 1980s.

Improvement Strategies

Program Evaluation: A number of studies in recent years have pointed to challenges in the evaluation of Title VII programs that are faced by OBEMLA. Local project staff have asked the Department to provide more explicit evaluation requirements, eliminate ones deemed excessive, and provide more assistance in meeting those requirements. State and local education personnel have commented on the limited coverage provided by the two Evaluation Assistance Centers, given their current level of staff resources. Finally, there exists wide variability in the completeness and quality of evaluation plans and reports provided by local grantees. The program office developed a number of initiatives to improve the receipt, review and use of grantee evaluation reports.

Legislation proposed by the Administration for reauthorization of Title VII strengthens through Part A the focus on increasing local capacity to develop and enhance high-quality services to LEP students to help them attaining challenging state standards, by refocusing and restructuring federal support for bilingual education. Three discretionary grant categories (except for the Academic Excellence dissemination program, moved to Part B) replace the six current Part A grant programs: (1) two year Enhancement grants to develop state and locally funded programs or to initiate new programs; (2) five year Comprehensive School grants to develop and implement school-wide bilingual programs; and (3) five-year Comprehensive District grants to LEAs to develop and implement district-wide programs that serve all or most LEP students. All three programs may include services to parents of LEP students, tutorials and academic or career counseling and acquisition of materials, software, and technologies specifically designed for LEP children. All applicants must describe how the Title VII grant is consistent with any systemic reform plan and Title I plan.

The new grants would ensure that bilingual programs are not isolated from the overall school program, emphasize comprehensive reform, and build local capacity to serve LEP students. The proposal also simplifies program administration and provides LEAs with additional flexibility to design programs that meet local needs. A significantly expanded role for SEAs is integral to this change.

III. Sources of Information

1. Prospects: The Congressionally Mandated Study of Educational Growth and Opportunity, the Interim Report. (Washington, D.C.: Prepared for Office of the Under Secretary, U.S. Department of Education by Abt Associates, Inc, by Michael J. Puma, Calvin C. Jones, Donald Rock and Roberto Fernandez, 1993.)

2. Program files.

3. Fleischman, Howard L. and Paul J. Hopstock. Descriptive Study of Services to Limited English Proficient Students: Volume 1, Summary of Findings and Conclusions (Washington D.C.: Development Associates, Inc., Prepared for Office of the Under Secretary, Education Department, 1993).

4. Gunderson, D., et al., Descriptive Study of the Family English Literacy Program (Reston, VA: Atlantic Resources Corporation, 1991).

5. Ramirez, D., et al., Longitudinal Study of Structured English Immersion Strategy, Early-Exit and Late-Exit Transitional Bilingual Education Programs for Language-Minority Children, Volumes I and II. (San Mateo, CA: Aguirre International, February 1991).

6. Michael M. Meyer and Stephen E. Fienberg, Editors. Assessing Evaluation Studies: The Case of Bilingual Education Strategies, National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1992.

7. Academic Performance of Limited-English-Proficient Indian Elementary Students in Reservation Schools (Arlington, VA: Development Associates, Inc., 1988).

8. Tikunoff, W. J., et al., A Descriptive Study of Significant Features of the Exemplary Special Alternative Instructional Program (Los Alamitos, CA: SouthWest Regional Educational Laboratory, 1991).

9. Brush, L., et al., Descriptive Evaluation of the Preschool Special Populations Program (Washington, D.C.: Pelavin Associates, Inc., 1992).

10. Bateman, Peter, Jill Hensley, Lynne Adduci, June Sivilli, Kathy Zantal-Wiener. New Land, New Knowledge: An Evaluation of Two Education Programs Serving Refugee and Immigrant Students (Washington, D.C.: Prepared for Office of the Under Secretary, U.S. Department of Education by Cosmos Corporation, 1993.)

11. The Title VII Academic Excellence Program: Disseminating Effective Programs and Practices in Bilingual Education (Washington, D.C.: Prepared for the Office of the Under Secretary, U.S. Department of Education by Policy Studies Associates, Inc. and SRI International, 1994.)

12. Pelavin, S., et al., Selection Procedures for Identifying Students in Need of Language Services (Washington, DC: Pelavin Associates, Inc., 1988).

13. Model Strategies in Bilingual Education: Family Literacy and Parent Involvement (Washington, D.C.: Prepared for the Office of the Under Secretary, U.S. Department of Education by Policy Studies Associates, Inc., 1993).

14. Burkheimer, Jr. G.J., et al. The National Longitudinal Study of the Effectiveness of Instruction of LEP Students, Research Triangle Park, NC: Research Triangle Institute, 1990.

15. Federal Education Programs for Limited-English Proficient Students: A Blueprint for the Second Generation. Report of the Stanford Working Group. (Stanford, California: Kenji Hakuta, Chair, Stanford Working Group, Stanford University, 1993).

16. Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Centre for Educational Research and Innovation. Education and Culture and Linguistic Pluralism: Synthesis of Case Studies -- Effective Strategies and Approaches in the Schools. (Paris, France, Oct. 14, 1991.

17. Serving Different Masters: Title VII Evaluation Practice and Policy, Volume 1 -- Final Report. (Washington, D.C.: Prepared for the Office of the Under Secretary by Abt Associates, Inc., 1993).

IV. Planned Studies

V. Contacts for Further Information

Program Operations:

John Ovard, (202) 205-5576--Academic Excellence, Special Populations, and Family English Literacy Programs, OBEMLA

Program Studies:

Dang Pham, (202) 205-5463 -- Research and Evaluation, OBEMLA
Jeffery Rodamar, (202) 401-1958, Office of the Under Secretary

[Foreign Languages Assistance]

[Bilingual Education Programs--Data Collection, Evaluation, and Research--Part B]