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April 6, 2022
Celebrating National Arab American Heritage Month
April is National Arab American Heritage Month! Did you know that since school year (SY) 2008–09, the number of Arabic-speaking English learner (EL) students has increased by roughly 75 percent, or over 49,000 students? Arabic was the most common language, after Spanish, spoken by ELs in SY 2015–16, followed by Chinese. Get more facts from English Learners Who are Arab Americans.
Profile of ELs in the United States

More than 5 million ELs were enrolled in U.S. schools in grades K–12 during SY 2017–18. Profile of English Learners in the United States explores data on increases and decreases in EL student enrollment by state and proficiency assessment results for English language, math, reading/language arts, and science.
Call for National Professional Development (NPD) Peer Reviewers

We’re seeking individuals to serve as peer reviewers for the FY 2022 NPD Program grant competition. For more information, view the NPD grant overview and the instructions on how to apply to be a peer reviewer. Email questions to NPD2022@ed.gov.
NCELA Resource Library
Visit our database of 20,000+ resources.
National Bilingual/Multilingual Learner Advocacy Month
This April, join the Office of English Language Acquisition (OELA) as we recognize National Bilingual/Multilingual Learner Advocacy Month. As the populations of bilingual and multilingual learners (MLLs) continue to grow, we want to celebrate their accomplishments, affirm the assets that they bring to the educational environment, and advocate for the resources they need to succeed in school and life.
 
We’ve created a social media toolkit that you can use to share resources from OELA, the U.S. Department of Education, and other organizations in the field. These resources focus on multilingualism, bilingual education, newcomers, and sources for finding student data.
 
Use the #MLLAdvocacy2022 hashtag to help us amplify your posts!
Announcements
Lessons from the Field: Supporting the Social & Emotional Learning Needs of Afghan & Other Newcomer Students 
In case you missed it, you can now watch a recording of Lessons from the Field: Supporting the Social and Emotional Learning Needs of Afghan and Other Newcomer Students, a webinar featuring information on strategies to assist Afghan and other newcomer students as they enter American schools. As part of Operation Allies Welcome, the U.S. Department of Education recognizes the immediate and urgent need to provide high-quality, culturally responsive approaches to support the social and emotional needs of Afghan students in their new learning environments.

The information presented is relevant to other newcomer student populations. A panel discussion with practitioners from the field directly engaged with supporting newcomers is the focus of this webinar. More information along with supplemental resources can be found here. The webinar previously announced for April 18 will be rescheduled. 
NPD Grantee Featured in TESOL Quarterly
Obscuring Equity in Dual Language Bilingual Education: A Longitudinal Study of Emergent Bilingual Achievement, Course Placements, and Grades, a research article from authors Trish Morita-Mullaney, Jennifer Renn, and Ming Chiu, is featured in TESOL Quarterly. The article reports on the work of two OELA-funded NPD grants: Project PUEDE and Project PILAR.
 
The article will be available as a free download for 2 months. Dual language bilingual education (DLBE) is a form of bilingual education that has the potential to preserve and develop the heritage languages of emergent bilinguals, foster high levels of bilingualism, and address academic disparities, thereby changing emergent bilinguals’ educational conditions and learning outcomes. Yet, DLBE schools and programs are situated within a broader sociopolitical context, which may mitigate the benefits of DLBE. To investigate DLBE and its potential to foster equity, this study examines a cohort of emergent bilinguals’ academic achievement, middle school course placements, and course grades across 6 school years. 
Upcoming Events
How can teachers leverage podcasts to deepen their ELs’ language proficiency? What is the connection between building listening skills and improved reading comprehension in EL students? Listenwise’s Monica Brady-Myerov will be joined by multilingual thought leader and author Valentina Gonzalez for a conversation exploring the listening-reading connection. Together they will share their perspectives and experiences on the importance of teaching listening in order to build literacy. Teachers will leave this webinar with practical instructional strategies for ELs.
In this first of several webinars on Teaching for Success presented by the Center for the Success of English Learners, Drs. Michael Kieffer and David Francis present on work of the Policy Strand of the center that was recently shared at the Institute of Education Sciences Principal Investigators meeting.
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic many school districts are implementing social and emotional learning (SEL) to facilitate student learning, healing, and connection. Join experts from the American Institutes for Research, Harmony SEL at National University, the Center to Improve Social Emotional Learning and School Safety at WestEd, and a panel of three local practitioners from diverse settings to discuss specific teaching practices that can be used in elementary and secondary classrooms to meet the needs of today’s students.
Join the Center for Academic Language Development and Seidlitz Education for a webinar at 2:00 p.m. PT/5:00 p.m. ET featuring Dr. Carol Salva.
Educators, school board members, parents/guardians, students, and community members are invited to join the SCCOE for a celebration of the excellent work that is happening in Santa Clara County around bilingual/MLLs. The showcase will:

  • Highlight programs that are making a positive impact on bilingual/MLLs;
  • Build a network of champions for bilingual/MLLs; and
  • Celebrate and honor student artwork winners and school and district teams.
This series is presented by the EL Collaborative of the Council of Chief State School Officers, OELA, and the National Association of English Learner Program Administrators. Continuous Improvement of EL Programs includes the following sessions:
 
  • May 18: Webinar – Evidence-Based Programs
  • May 25: Debrief, Questions, Networking
  • June 1: Voices from the Field Panel
With the support of the Stabilizing Indigenous Languages Steering (SILS) Committee and the American Indian/Indigenous Teacher Education Conference (AIITEC) Planning Committee, a decision was made to host a combined SILS/AIITEC hybrid conference at NAU Flagstaff Campus that allows for bot/h virtual and in-person attendance. The deadline for proposal submission is April 15. Download the proposal form and email completed proposals to AIITEC@nau.edu.
July 13–15
Virtual Conference
Attend keynotes and sessions led by SIOP® authors, guest keynote speaker Kelly Yang (award-winning author of Front Desk), and phenomenal K–12 educators from across the U.S. Learn best practices to foster academic language development and make learning relevant and comprehensible for language learners. 
In the News
AZ Central     
In Arizona, the disruption to education and switch to remote learning during the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in students in English language learning programs having the lowest passing rates of any groups of students, including homeless students and students with special needs. Fewer than 2% of ELs who took math and reading tests in 2020–21 passed the exams. Even though scores for all student groups declined, the very low passing rates of ELs can be attributed to a number of unique challenges such as limited access to equitable and effective instruction that existed prior to the pandemic; parents being unable to help their children because they are not proficient in English themselves; and limited access to technology and the internet.
Chalkbeat
The New Jersey Consortium for Immigrant Children, a coalition of legal advocates for immigrant youth, released a report stating that immigrant students in New Jersey need more support in schools to address their unique mental health needs. Immigrant experiences can be traumatic, isolating, and distressing for children. Many schools lack bilingual mental health staff to work with ELs and their families, counselors who understand an immigrant student’s experiences, and programs to help immigrant students who recently arrived adjust to their new life. The report makes several recommendations: hiring bilingual mental health professionals; creating student-led, teacher-facilitated community groups to help new immigrant students adjust; and requiring training for all staff to learn how to be sensitive to the needs of immigrant students.
Virginia Department of Education
The purpose of this guidebook is to help educators and stakeholders identify and best work with Students with Limited and/or Interrupted Formal Education (SLIFE). This document addresses the SLIFE definition, programmatic guiding principles, identification of SLIFE, instructional recommendations, and additional considerations for working with SLIFE.
Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL)
This CAL webinar looks at key insights from the research on MLLs and successful transition from high school into college and/or the workforce. Special guests Dr. Yasuko Kanno, Dr. Ester de Jong, and Dr. Keira Ballantyne frame this policy discussion around equity in practice, centering the focus of policymakers, researchers, and practitioners on MLLs through an assets- and equity-based lens.
TESOL
In this blog entry, the author outlines six strategies for reading comprehension based on the Reading Workshop teaching method that she developed to help MLLs. The strategies include visualizing, making connections with text, asking questions, deciding what is relevant, highlighting, and synthesizing information. 
Professional Learning
The WIDA Fellows program brings expert teachers and WIDA professional learning specialists together in a collaborative effort to enhance the development of WIDA professional learning offerings. WIDA fellows serve as classroom implementation experts and critical friends to the WIDA professional learning design team. Selected candidates serve for 1 year and have the option to continue for a second.
The La Cosecha 2022 Hybrid Conference, scheduled for November 2–5 in Santa Fe, New Mexico, will focus on providing instructional and programmatic support to best serve ELs and emerging bilingual students. La Cosecha will feature over 180 professional presentations and workshops for supporting two-way and one-way immersion, developmental bilingual, and heritage/tribal language immersion programs and bring together educators, parents, researchers, and practitioners from across the U.S. The La Cosecha Conference Planning Committee invites you to share your promising practices, instructional strategies, research, experiences, and overall dual language expertise with your colleagues and dual language community by presenting at this year’s conference. 
DLeNM: Summer Institutes, Registration Open
  • June 1–2: AIM4S3 Math 2-Day Virtual Institute – This institute is designed to deepen your mathematical understanding and support you in addressing students’ mathematical gaps. Join DLeNM to experience effective and engaging mathematics instructional strategies to support in-person instruction while deepening your own mathematical knowledge. This will be a hands-on institute targeting K–8 mathematics educators and secondary teachers working with ELs, emerging bilinguals, and students who struggle with math.
  • June 7–8: Hybrid Summer Institute 2022 – Join DLeNM in-person or virtually for sessions that will support you in building your understanding of powerful frameworks; engage in student-centered instructional strategies for the core content areas of math, language arts, social studies, and science; and deepen your understanding of how to integrate content and language to support ELs and emerging bilinguals.
Job Opportunities
American Institutes for Research
Remote + Washington, DC; Chicago, IL; Boston, MA; Oakland, CA; or Austin, TX, metro areas
Marietta City Schools
Marietta, GA
Connect With NCELA
Podcast: Dual Language Education

How can you position yourself as an advocate for quality dual language programs? Get useful teaching tips and ideas from Drs. Maria Coady, Marco Bravo, and Louise Lockard in OELA’s podcast on dual language education. 
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National Clearinghouse for English Language Acquisition (NCELA)
Disclaimer: NCELA Nexus is intended to share information that can be of use to educators, parents, learners, leaders, and other stakeholders in their efforts to ensure that every student, including ELs, is provided with the highest quality education and expanded opportunities to succeed. The information and materials presented on NCELA Nexus do not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by NCELA, the Office of English Language Acquisition (OELA), or the U.S. Department of Education.