Seeds of Change in the Central Coast
The Multitudes validation study is made possible by a representative sample of California public school children grades K-2. R.O. Hardin Elementary is one of over seventy-five schools around the state, that have joined us in research and development. As a member of our Community of Practice, Lilia Espinoza and other local champions provide guidance and feedback on the platform and share strategies for implementation in the multilingual context.
Progress in bilingual education is driven by communities like Hollister, California, and the Hollister School District, where R.O. Hardin Elementary principal Lilia Espinoza first came as an English learner.
Hollister is in San Benito County, the agricultural heart of the Central Coast, surrounded by farms, ranches, and vineyards. Pride in the region’s agrarian tradition is visible even in the name of the Hollister High School’s athletic teams, the Haybalers!
“I was scared out of my mind,” Lilia remembers, of her first day of school. At first, her mother sat at the back of her classroom, and Lilia turned back often, to see if she was still there. “I wanted the safety of being able to communicate with somebody in my English-only classroom.”
Lilia's early school experiences led her to become the English language development teacher she wished she had had. Now, as principal of R.O Hardin where English learners make up more than half the student body, she continues to share strategies and resources to reach her students within a new program and partnership that can be a model for other schools.
Cultivating Resiliency
Multitudes first visited the Hollister School District in the summer of 2021, as children returned to classrooms following the Covid-19 school closures. Although the pandemic revealed vulnerabilities and gaps across many systems, Lilia believes it also deepened the care, concern, and determination of teachers to connect. Access became literal. The IT staff, usually behind the scenes, were out in front of the school, meeting families and helping kids troubleshoot to get online.
Despite the loss of proximity, online access allowed insights into the daily struggles and resiliencies of their working families as kids connected to classrooms from the backseats of cars, or a closet in a crowded family home. During the first weeks of shelter in place, Lilia opened an online class to find one student connecting from the side of the road next to a field where her mother was working. "She turned her computer around and I see fields of strawberries!" In moments like these, teachers and administrators recommitted themselves, creatively, to meet their students' needs, wherever they were.
The students at R.O. Hardin are "curious, ready, and willing learners" Lilia said, and her seasoned staff has the trust of parents. A challenge, she says, can be finding ways to share back some of that trust with parents, some of whom are focused on providing for their family to the point of exhaustion and may not see themselves at the core of their child’s learning.
Partnering with Parents
Two years after the disruption of the pandemic, students, families, and teachers are still catching up. The creative workarounds of that time led Lilia and her staff to develop new initiatives to partner with parents. A literacy night at R.O. Hardin last February began with a shared meal in the school cafeteria before families headed to sessions that explored “doable, realistic, applicable” strategies that families can use at home to help their child grow in language and literacy.
In this spirit Lilia invited Multitudes to the event, to share more about the mission of our project. There, we made a direct appeal to parents to participate in a family survey of home language, demographics, and early childhood education that provides additional context and critical information for validation and bias testing.
Lilia worked closely with Multitudes research assistant and Hollister resident Nuvia Soto, to promote the survey as an opportunity for families to share their journey and hopes for their child. “It’s showing parents that we value their partnership, that we value their voice!” Lilia said.
As we aim to build a tool that is fair and accurate for students in one of the most linguistically diverse states in the country, Multitudes is grateful for the support and generosity of partner schools in the Hollister School District and leaders like Lilia, who have welcomed us to learn so much about the background, landscape, culture, and strengths of their students and teachers.
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